Three key reasons why February 22 is one of the most important dates in Styx history: 1) The band sign their first recording contract 51 years ago on this day in 1972; 2) Kilroy Was Here turns 40; and 3) Damn Yankees turns 33. Happy Anniversary Year 51 to Styx, y’all!
Current band photos by Jason Powell
“To me, there is an arc to every artist’s career. First, you become known initially as a performer. And then you begin to establish yourself with new songs and new music. You may do a cover song here or there, but mostly you go with new material written by you or by others. That goes on for a while — and then you get signed.” — James “JY” Young
Hello friends! Today, we celebrate one of the most important dates in Styx history — namely, February 22. Three major milestones in the Styx universe all occurred on this most hallowed of dates, the very first and most important of which happened exactly 51 years ago to the day — so let’s tackle each of them chronologically, shall we?
IF I HAD A WOODEN NICKEL
First, and most important in the 2.22 trifecta, Styx signed their first official recording contract with the Chicago-based independent label Wooden Nickel Records 51 years ago today on February 22, 1972. The five co-founding members of Styx at the time of that most notable hometown Wooden Nickel label signing can all be seen in the vintage of-era photo seen at the very top of this column, from left to right: bassist Chuck Panozzo, drummer John Panozzo, guitarist/vocalist John “J.C.” Curulewski, keyboardist/vocalist Dennis DeYoung, and guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young. And, as JY himself confirms, “Within 14 months of my joining the band, we had our first recording contract.”
From there, Styx proceeded to create their first four studio albums for Wooden Nickel — Styx (1972), Styx II (1973), The Serpent Is Rising (1973), and Man of Miracles (1974) — before joining the well-respected A&M Records roster with December 1975’s Equinox. In fact, JY and I actually began talking about how the band would celebrate their 50th anniversary in 2022 at least six years ago, and perhaps it was four or so summers ago when he gave me the following quite prescient prediction: “I keep coming back to the idea that early 2022 is the 50th anniversary of us signing our first recording agreement, so I imagine we’ll do something special for that when the time comes,” he theorized in the most perfect, JY-like way possible.
And, as we all saw quite handily all throughout 2022, Styx celebrated Year 50 in as many magical ways as possible. For starters, the band performed in Tallahassee, Florida, last February 22, and then they immediately followed up that gig the next night by doing another show in guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw’s hometown of Montgomery, Alabama, on February 23. A fantastic summer 2022 tour with Loverboy and REO Speedwagon oh-so-appropriately dubbed Live & UnZoomed followed soon enough comprised of 45 shows all told, and many other great gigs occurred throughout the balance of the year, including a swing in Western Canada with Nancy Wilson’s Heart in October. All told, Styx played 96 shows in 2022, and they show few signs of slowing down here in Year 51, a.k.a. 2023.
But for now, let’s get back to the beginning! Cementing the initial Wooden Nickel contract was a pivotal point in JY’s mind, for it legitimized the groundwork Styx had been laying down in the local clubs in Chicago they’d been playing in up to that moment. “To me, there is an arc to every artist’s career,” he explains. “First, you become known initially as a performer. And then there’s the arc of, if you’re a writer, will you write your own stuff? If so, then you begin to establish yourself with new songs and new music. You may do a cover song here or there, but mostly you go with new material written by you or by others. That goes on for a while — and then you get signed.”
Besides perfecting the art of live performance, Styx was ultimately able to master the recording aspect of their career as well, especially once the aforementioned guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw joined the band when he replaced J.C. in December 1975, a mere two weeks after Equinox had been released. “At that point, we had three very distinct writing styles and writers, and it was the middle ground where we all collaborated where there was magic,” JY recounts. “That said, every career seems to have an initial creative phase like we did. Our first one started in ’72, and ran through ’83.”
If anything, that first decade of existence vaulted Styx indelibly into the pantheon of great American rock bands who continue to have an enduring impact on a truly international scale — though perhaps nobody could have predicted back then we’d still be talking about it all to such a degree 51 years later. That said, JY’s co-founding compadre in arms, bassist Chuck Panozzo, was quite eager to try Year 50 on for size — as well as Year 51, which we’ll get to in a moment.
Chuck and I spent a good amount of time talking about that very golden idea while we sat together on a black leather couch in the dressing room he was sharing with JY and Tommy at The Pearl at The Palms in Las Vegas back on January 20, 2019, just a few hours before the band performed the entirety of June 2017’s The Mission for the very first time in front of a live audience. (Interestingly enough, Chuck and I had a similar deep-dive conversation on that very same couch at The Palms almost exactly a year later to the day on January 19, 2020 — but that remains a story for another time.)
“As we’ve talked about before, I plan on being here for the 50th year, and whatever comes after that,” Chuck reiterated while we both were concurrently bemused at what I can only describe as a ginormous brownie cake on a wide white plate on the table in front of us. “I remember Johnny [i.e., his late twin brother, John, who sadly passed away in 1996] and me playing together in that basement in Chicago like it was yesterday, and I felt him with me while we were rehearsing The Mission. I worked really hard to learn my parts so I wouldn’t let anybody down. I love standing out there and playing with my brothers in the band every night.”
I then told Chuck I was holding him to being fully involved as Year 50 officially commenced, and if his triumphant appearance with the band in Las Vegas during their annual residency at The Venetian and in Pompano Beach, Florida, on February 18, 2022 were any indication — the latter being deemed a “hometown gig,” as he referred to it on Instagram the following day — we’ll be seeing Chuck out on the boards with his bandmates for many more years to come.
Incidentally, Chuck and I touched base not long after the calendar turned to 2023, and he again reiterated his commitment to playing with Styx as long as he can. “We’re performing better than ever,” he told me right around the time the band was rehearsing for their annual Venetian run that took place over five nights that were spread across late January and early February. Eagle-eyes and ears will have duly observed Chuck newly joining the band onstage for a song he hadn’t performed with them very often, if not much at all, before that (and I won’t spoil it here for anyone who has yet to see it). “It’s a proud part of my legacy,” he explained.
Guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw, who came on up to Chicago from his bowling alley band gig in Montgomery, Alabama, in December 1975 to (as noted earlier) replace J.C. a scant few weeks after Equinox was released, told me just a few weeks ago while he was in Las Vegas for the Venetian residency, “I was always tight with the Panozzo brothers, and I’ve always been supportive of Chuck. Who doesn’t love Chuck Panozzo? He’s wise and experienced, and if you’ve ever spent any time with him, you realize just what an incredible person he is.” (Hear, hear!)
Tommy is also forever grateful for both sharing in and nurturing Styx’s ongoing legacy. “It’s been an amazing voyage. The music has stood the test of time, and it has grown over that time,” he marvels. “I wasn’t there for those first few years, but I have been here for well over 45 years. When we walk off the stage, we feel like, ‘Well, we’ve done it again.’ And that’s the thing that keeps us suiting up — writing new material, recording new material, releasing it, going out and promoting it, mixing it in with the classic songs, and figuring out ways to continue to tell the story. I can’t imagine ever not doing this. You know, it’s still really nice to be here. And to think it all started with John and Chuck Panozzo — without them, we would not be having this conversation.” (True that!)
Keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan, who joined Styx fulltime in 1999, recognizes the weight of the band’s long and storied history, night after night. “Styx celebrating 51 years is a momentous occasion, and I’m really proud and honored to be a part of this band’s legacy,” Lawrence says with much admiration. “It puts a big smile on my face to stand alongside JY, Chuck, Tommy, Todd, Ricky, Will, and all the musicians who’ve played a role in this group’s success since February 22, 1972. We are the culmination of the efforts of every member, past and present, and continue to hold ourselves up to that long-established high standard with each record we make, and every show we play. Now more than a half a century, and still rocking strong. Viva Styx!”
Drummer Todd Sucherman, who came aboard in 1995 to first record with the band and then joined the fold fulltime in 1996 when John Panozzo became too ill to perform on that year’s Return to Paradise Tour, echoes Lawrence’s sentiments with his own poignant commentary. “It’s great to be part of an organization that can have such an incredible milestone,” Todd observes. “I congratulate my musical brothers on this fantastic accomplishment, and I’m looking forward to playing many shows this year to celebrate the 51st anniversary!”
Bassist/vocalist Ricky Phillips, who joined the band fulltime in 2003, got right to the heart of the matter. “Why has Styx lasted for 50 years, now going on 51? Everybody in the band does their homework — and that’s a really great thing,” Ricky notes. “It’s probably the first band I’ve ever been in where people treat everything with great care and great respect. The love we all have for each other is a brotherhood, and it’s not just when we’re onstage. We all get along, beyond all those musical reasons why we play so well together. Tommy calls it ‘a good hang,’ and that’s what we do together whenever we’re not performing.”
Finally, Styx’s newest bandmember, guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich, who himself came aboard fulltime during the summer of 2021, adds his own unique perspective from the POV of someone who was born a mere six weeks after the band’s first recording contract was signed in 1972. “What’s remarkable about it is in the way it’s evolved,” Will points out. “In fact, the band is more relevant than ever, and I think that’s a testimony to the people who are empowered in this band — Tommy Shaw and James Young, the guys who want to see a vital, creative band. It would be one thing if the music wasn’t up to the standard level of the old, great records in the Styx canon. Tommy is always keeping an eye on making sure the thread is that the music always sounds like Styx.”
To borrow a line or two from Styx’s most recent, and most excellent studio album, June 2021’s Crash of the Crown, “A new day is calling.” Happy anniversary year 51, y’all — and many, many happy returns!!
DOMO ARIGATO, Y’ALL
The second of our three 2.22 milestones occurred 40 years ago today on February 22, 1983, when Styx released Kilroy Was Here, their 11th studio album, on A&M Records, which also became the last studio album they’d release before taking an extended, decade-plus hiatus until they reunited in 1995 to first record an updated version of their very first hit from the Wooden Nickel era — duly redubbed as “Lady ’95” for their Greatest Hits compilation that was released that August — and then for the ensuing Return to Paradise Tour in 1996.
Kilroy Was Here spawned a large-scale concept-oriented tour of its own, went platinum, and reached No. 3 on the Billboard Top 200 Albums chart. Kilroy also graced us with two big hit singles: “Mr. Roboto,” which itself climbed to No. 3 (and begat a quite popular concept video), and “Don’t Let It End” made it to No. 6. (A third single, “High Time,” was only able to make it to No. 48.)
Since 1999, Styx had essentially shied away from performing practically any material from Kilroy Was Here, sans a few song excerpts here and there during the lengthy “Styx Medley” the band used to perform fairly regularly a decade-plus ago — but that all changed in a literal instant on May 30, 2018, when, at 10:38 p.m. Pacific time, they debuted a notable, muscularly recast “Mr. Roboto” as the first song of their traditional two-song encore at Five Point Ampitheatre in Irvine, California. This was the first full-band, full-song performance of “Mr. Roboto” onstage by Styx, well, ever, as the song was originally performed live in a purely solo fashion by Dennis DeYoung to a backing track on the 1983 Kilroy tour. An instant fan favorite, “Mr. Roboto” has since become a mainstay in the nightly encore, and it’s always followed by the band’s show-closing perma-classic, “Renegade.”
“For one thing, it was an idea whose time had come,” Tommy Shaw told me backstage that very afternoon in May 2018, just a few hours before Styx played it in front of the unsuspecting Five Point audience. “We’ve been working on it for a while, and we wanted to get it right. It was a lot harder to learn than I thought it would be. It’s a very original, unusual, unique track — and it’s not blues-based, either — but I have a feeling it will only get better from here. Know what? We’ll probably be playing it for a long time to come.” (As we all well know by now, Tommy’s not-so-secret prediction that day has since turned out to be 100 percent correct!)
Adds Chuck, “When Tommy first mentioned the idea of doing ‘Mr. Roboto,’ I thought it was a great idea. I said, ‘Why don’t we own it? We know the song is great.’ And I knew Lawrence would do a great job with it.” It’s perhaps a bit of an understatement to say Lawrence takes on the lead singing/performing role with unadulterated verve and panache by truly inhabiting the Roboto persona every night the song is performed. “Did I ever think I’d get a chance to do it?” he muses when I pose him the obvious question. “I was fine to do it all along — I really was. I think the character in the song is larger than life. I’ve found it to be pretty visceral.”
As he now enters his fifth year of playing “Mr. Roboto” in front of audiences, Gowan reiterates another key reason why he likes singing it — namely, that it reminds him so much of the same persona he inhabits in “A Criminal Mind,” his signature 1985 solo song that has since become an occasional Styx setlist favorite as well (especially when they perform either near or above the northern U.S. border). “I realized I like singing songs where the character has something they’re hiding,” he continues. “The ‘Roboto’ vocal is from the point of view of you’re hiding something and you’re going to reveal it to this audience, but, in fact, they’re really getting a look inside your brain — and I really like taking that point of view.” (You can also hear the Lawrence-led live version of “Mr. Roboto” on Side 2 of The Same Stardust EP that was released in June 2021 for Record Store Day, which has since become available on most major streaming platforms.)
As the song only keeps gaining more and more traction, other “Roboto” fans have made their voices known. “I heard it recently, and it was so interesting. It’s such an interesting thing,” Def Leppard guitarist Phil Collen confided in me one day backstage before admitting, “I thought it was really hokey when I first heard it — but it sounded really great on the radio! What a great song!” (Domo arigato and himitsu o shiritai, as the lyrics go in Japanese. . .)
Will Evankovich added yet another perspective to Kilroy and “Roboto” when he and I did the Zoom thing together during the 2022 holiday season. “I remember buying the Kilroy cassette at Wherehouse Music in 1983 — and I really liked that song,” Will recalled. “And I liked the band, of course, so I figured anything that was following [January 1981’s] Paradise Theatre was gonna be good. So, I’ve known that song since I was a wee lad, and you can’t blame any of the bands in 1983 for going the way of more keyboards and less electric guitars. I mean, everything had to change. It was a 20-something-year era of big rock guitars, and everyone was ready for a change to go into more of the keyboard sound. The problem was, it just went too far in that direction for a period of time — and then it didn’t really stand up as well as some of the other stuff did. But I think when you reintroduce some of the hard-rocking electric stuff into that style of production, it makes sense for how we’re playing ‘Mr. Roboto’ now.”
Interestingly enough, in January 2021, Tommy and I were discussing some of his favorite songs from Kilroy — and his renewed interest in revisiting them live. When I mentioned how much I personally love “Cold War,” a song that contains some of his most poignant, socially observational lyrics that continue to carry some serious weight to this very day of renewed international turmoil, Tommy replied with notable enthusiasm, “This band could totally play ‘Cold War’ live! In fact, I could hear us playing that one in my head just as you were saying that. And ‘Just Get Through This Night’ — wouldn’t that be something? We could also do ‘Haven’t We Been Here Before.’ Yeah, I love ‘Haven’t We Been Here Before.’ All we gotta do is keep waking up and put one foot in front of the other, and we’ll get there.”
(You’ll get no argument from these corners about such a great idea for live exploration, seeing how your trusty Styxologist would personally love to hear what Lawrence, Ricky, Todd, and Will could all do together with the arrangements of those particular songs — especially considering they weren’t on the original Kilroy album themselves.)
Naturally, I’ve consistently semi-joked with JY that he should revive his “Dr. Righteous” persona that’s oh-so-perfectly on display in the fan-favorite Kilroy track “Heavy Metal Poisoning.” JY has yet to send me out of the room whenever I’ve brought that thought up in conversation — and he’s even quoted a lyric or two from the song back to me in that vaunted character’s voice, to boot — so, hey, you never know! (“A toxic wasteland in your ear canal,” indeed. . .)
DAMN STRAIGHT
Finally, the third 2.22 milestone signpost is that, 33 years ago on February 22, 1990, Damn Yankees released their self-titled debut on Warner Bros. Records. As most of you know, the DY supergroup configuration consisted of our man guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw, Night Ranger bassist/vocalist Jack Blades, guitarist extraordinaire Ted Nugent, and drummer Michael Cartellone (the latter of whom has played drums with Lynyrd Skynyrd since 1999). Damn Yankees has long been certified double platinum, and it reached lucky No. 13 on the album charts. “High Enough” reached No. 3 on the singles charts, while “Come Again” reached No. 50, and “Coming of Age” got to No. 60.
A few choice Damn Yankees songs have made their way into many Styx sets over the years — including Tommy consistently singing a few verses of “Come Again” before going into “Crystal Ball” prior to Crash of the Crown’s “Sound the Alarm” entering into the setlist. Not only that, but both “Coming of Age” and “High Enough” were re-recorded by Styx for inclusion on their 2011 Regeneration Volume II CD. (And please take note — both tracks also happened to see some key production guidance from none other than, yep, Will Evankovich, who initially came into the picture at Jack Blades’ suggestion when Jack and Tommy began doing shows together as Shaw Blades in 2007, and they needed another guitarist and harmony vocal foil to join them onstage.)
“High Enough” even made a fully unplugged acoustic appearance during the blackout half of Styx’s show at the Sunset Center in Carmel, California, back on January 16, 2019. And, by now, you’ve certainly likely seen Tommy’s totally galvanized solo version of “Come Again” as performed in his home studio in Nashville in mid-2020, a performance that was a main fixture during some of the set breaks and/or post-show codas that became intrinsic parts of some of the entries in the band’s popular Styx Fix YouTube concert series in 2020.
“I’ve always been a fan of both Tommy Shaw and Styx, and we did very well with the Damn Yankees,” according to Ron Nevison, the man who produced both Damn Yankees and their August 1992 followup, Don’t Tread, when we conducted our Styxology interview in June 2016. “I liked all of the original demos for songs like ‘Come Again,’ and ‘Coming of Age,’ but I thought ‘High Enough’ was the coup de grace. After I heard ‘High Enough,’ I flipped out, and I told the label I wanted to do the album.” (And who could blame him?)
THE ENDURING POWER OF 2.22
At any rate, the perfectly harmonious date of 2.22 also dovetails quite nicely in parallel with the pivotal release date of Styx’s seminal seventh album, The Grand Illusion, on 7.7.77 — just like they planned it all along! In the meantime, while you’re letting the balance of this super calendrical symmetry sink in, let us one and all raise a collective glass to toast 51 years of Styx — a true next-step milestone in the history of our favorite rock band! Who knows what the next half-century-plus will bring?
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Celebrating the ongoing resonance of Styx’s first full-length studio album of the 2000s, which was released on February 18, 2003.
Cyclorama, Styx’s 14th studio album and their first full-length collection of all-original material of the 2000s, was released 20 years ago today on February 18, 2003 by Sanctuary/CMC International. The album was produced by Tommy Shaw, James Young, and Gary Loizzo, and it contains such enduring tracks as “One With Everything,” “These Are the Times,” “Yes I Can,” “More Love for the Money,” and “Fields of the Brave.”
Cyclorama — which also saw a wonderfully enveloping 5.1 surround-sound mix done by the late, great Loizzo for both the DVD-Audio and DualDisc formats via the Silverline label — reached No. 127 on The Billboard 200 Albums chart. On the singles front, “Waiting for Our Time” reached No. 37 on the Mainstream Rock Tracks chart. Cyclorama wouldn’t be followed up by another all-original Styx studio album until 14 years later, with the June 2017 release of The Mission.
Almost 30 months ago to the day — at 12 p.m. Eastern time on August 21, 2020, to be exact — a new animated lyric video treatment for the aforementioned “These Are the Times” was unveiled on Styx’s YouTube channel to coincide with Cyclorama’s 2020 debut on all major download and streaming platforms. The video was directed by longtime band associate Steve Jones, a lifelong friend of co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young. Jones also happens to be an accomplished film producer to boot (see Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer and Mad Dog and Glory, to name but a few). If you haven’t seen the gripping “These Are the Times” clip yet, or would like to revisit it like you know you should, you can check it out here.
JY continues to have great admiration for “These Are the Times,” as he recently told me when we talked about the videoclip. “It’s a really great song, and I had kind of forgotten about it because Cyclorama was really kind of lost,” JY admits. “So, the notion of turning that song into a video was really [Styx manager] Charlie Brusco’s idea, but it was inspired by the video for ‘Brave New World’ [another Steve Jones creation that premiered on Styx’s YouTube channel back on July 23, 2020, which you can watch right here]. You know, we have some really great songs that we now have the ability to make great videos for, dirt cheap!” JY concludes with his signature laugh. “And I just really wanted to do something here with that one.”
In a Styxworld exclusive, in addition to some more comments from JY, guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw, keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan, drummer Todd Sucherman, former bandmember Glen Burtnik, the late producer Gary Loizzo, the late drum tech Paul Carrizzo, and lighting director/designer Libby Gray all chime in to tell us the tale of how Cyclorama came to be, and how it continues to live on in our hearts and minds today. Somewhere down the road that we follow / We’ll be one with everything. . .
Tommy Shaw: Cyclorama was a fun record to make. It was a real “California experience” type of record. We recorded some of the vocals standing outside. That was in my home studio up in Beachwood Canyon in Los Angeles, where I lived for quite a few years before moving to Nashville. After we released the album, we went on a great tour with Journey and REO Speedwagon, and sold out arenas all across the country [from May to August 2003].
Lawrence [Gowan] had been in the band for three years at that point, and it was our first album with him. We didn’t realize it at the time, but Glen [Burtnik] would be leaving that year around my birthday in September, and that was when [bassist/vocalist] Ricky Phillips came into the picture. [Ricky joined Styx fulltime in October 2003.]
I remember both Lawrence and me standing underneath a palm tree, getting this great vocal sound outside. It’s something we learned from [Damn Yankees producer/engineer] Ron Nevison, who had told us about recording Paul Rodgers outside singing the song “Bad Company.” So, we tried it — and we loved it.
Lawrence Gowan: Since 2010, a lot of Styx fans in the U.S. have said to me, “How come you don’t do solo shows in America?” So, in 2015, I began doing some solo shows in the States where I combined material from my solo life with some Styx songs. I don’t know why, but I had overlooked playing some songs from Cyclorama, and it was amazing how many people were yelling out for “More Love for the Money” and “Fields of the Brave.”
Now, I hadn’t played those songs in so many years. I took a stab at “More Love for the Money,” and that went well. It was a learning thing for me, and it was the first time I had done a full solo show in the United States [in Nottingham, Maryland, on December 16, 2015]. I realized that, for a lot of the audience, Cyclorama is in their lexicon as much as anything is from the Styx catalog, so I better address that, you know? Once I got another chance to do the solo thing again, I began thinking about including those songs in my solo sets in their full versions.
Tommy Shaw: We had a great time jamming on those songs. “One With Everything” was this amazing song that went through all sorts of changes. It had a different name at first — something crazy, like “My Beautiful Pompeii.” That was one of those songs where my wife Jeanne would come over and I’d say, “Listen to this song!” We’d start playing it and she’d go, “What the hell — ‘Pompeii’? What??” (laughs heartily) We realized at that point in our enthusiastic joy of creating this great piece of music that we hadn’t really thought about what we were singing! (laughs again)
So, there was a quick rewrite to “One With Everything” — which actually had a great deal of meaning. It’s one of our favorite things to play whenever we can fit it into the set, especially because of the great, progressive middle section that’s in there.
Todd Sucherman: I might be biased, but Cyclorama really surpassed my expectations. In fact, some of the more overt moments on [June 2021’s] Crash of the Crown are probably the most overt I’ve done since the big fills I did on “One With Everything.” And everyone in the band really shines on that track. It’s an epic piece that was really something to work on. There’s definitely a tip of the hat to the prog/art rock side of the band on that one.
Paul Carrizzo (Todd Sucherman’s drum tech for 20-plus years who sadly passed away in March 2022): When we did the Cyclorama album, Todd, Tommy, and JY all said they wanted Paulie in the studio. I was new in the camp, and I wasn’t yet familiar with the songs — but the thing I said to each of them was, “Give me a song you want this snare drum to sound like. Name a song familiar to you so I can have that kind of snare drum in mind — and I’ll get it for you.” And that’s we did.
Tommy Shaw: “Yes I Can” was another one of those California-based songs. The imagery is the California scene. And speaking of California, our friend Billy Bob Thornton makes an appearance [doing lead vocals on “Bourgeois Pig”], and Tenacious D is in there somewhere too! [Jack Black and Kyle Gass — a.k.a. Tenacious D — appear on the hidden track “The Chosen One,” which follows directly after “Genki Desu Ka.”]
Right up until we began incorporating songs from The Mission into our set a few years ago, we used the song “Genki Desu Ka” as our walk-off music. “Genki Desu Ka” is Japanese — a very polite way of saying, “Do you feel good?”
Todd Sucherman: When Styx did Live With Regis and Kelly [on July 29, 2003] to perform “Yes I Can,” we were sort of like the house band. I was like the MD [musical director] calling the bumpers [the music the band played during the commercial breaks] in and out back then, so I knew what I was getting myself into once I got the call to be a guest drummer on Late Night With Seth Meyers [in 2018, and again in 2020].
Tommy Shaw: Cyclorama also had this great Storm Thorgerson album cover, our final Storm album cover. He and his team did [September 1978’s] Pieces of Eight as well. We were proud to be associated with him and his great, iconic album covers.
[Your Styxologist clarifies: Storm Thorgerson, who passed away on April 18, 2013, is perhaps best known for designing album covers and related artwork for the likes of Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin with partner Aubrey Powell in the British graphic design firm Hipgnosis. For his part, Powell was directly involved in the Pieces of Eight cover design.]
Libby Gray (longtime Styx lighting director/designer): During “Too Much Time on My Hands” in our live show, it probably doesn’t register to the casual fan it’s the Cyclorama bunny clock that’s up there for five or six seconds on the video wall. It probably doesn’t register that the clock spinning around is on the cover art for the Cyclorama album — and that’s ok. I’m not going to put the word Cyclorama under it, and I’m not gonna hit you over the head with it. But it’s a gift for the people who do understand, and then go (exclaims), “Really! Wow!! I haven’t seen that cover in about 10 years!”
Glen Burtnik (bassist/guitarist/vocalist who also sang lead vocals on “Kiss Your Ass Goodbye” and “Killing the Thing That You Love,” and ultimately left Styx in September 2003): The thing with Cyclorama is, that was a really excellent experience. I think it’s a really good album. It was a real collaboration, especially “One With Everything.” That was a real collaboration between everyone in the band. All of us were involved in that one. I enjoyed that experience, and I think Todd [Sucherman] plays great on it. Yeah, I like that album a lot. It’s probably my favorite Styx album. (laughs) It was a pleasure to be in Styx, and probably the most professional act I’ve ever worked with. It’s a good machine. It’s a very impressive run this band from the Midwest has had.
Gary Loizzo (Styx’s longtime producer/live engineer who passed away from cancer in January 2016): Tommy — he’s always into experimenting. (laughs) That’s just the way he is, and it always worked out for the best — especially on our later records, like Cyclorama. To me, Cyclorama was one of the better records we recorded. Never to be heard, really — but I know I enjoyed it when I recorded it, and that was the closest I ever was with the band. A truly, truly great experience. I enjoyed working with Glen Burtnik too. What a great talent.
There’s great songwriting on Cyclorama, with a great representation of sounds. They were experimenting with many really good musical ideas. I really, really enjoyed that album, and I think it never got the recognition I think it deserved.
James “JY” Young: Cyclorama is a great record. But there was just no way for it to get traction back in those days.
Tommy Shaw: Cyclorama was kind of an experimental record, just to see where we were as a band after having reformed in 1999. We were stretching our legs in the studio, and there was a lot of growth and moving forward. That’s how I look at that album. Whenever I think of Cyclorama, it puts a smile on my face.
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Today’s the day Paradise Theatre first made history when it was released 42 years ago on January 19, 1981.
Is it any wonder that Paradise Theatre made such a lasting impression when it was released 42 years ago today by A&M Records on January 19, 1981? In fact, Paradise Theatre (or Theater, depending on which part of the album sleeve you’re viewing) was Styx’s first album to reach No. 1, which it did for three non-consecutive weeks on the Billboard Top 200 Albums chart not too long after its initial release. Paradise Theatre ultimately sold over 3 million copies, making it Styx’s fourth multiplatinum album in a row — the first time any rock band in history had ever achieved such a vaunted sales feat.
“I can hardly keep track of all our anniversaries,” admits guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw with a hearty laugh, “but I really do love how much Paradise Theatre has endured — and I appreciate all the ways the fans continue to embrace this music of ours.”
The facts are these: Paradise Theatre, Styx’s tenth studio album, was recorded, engineered, and mixed in 1980 at Pumpkin Studios in Oak Lawn, Illinois, with the late, great Gary Loizzo at the helm. (Loizzo passed away seven years ago after a long battle with cancer on January 16, 2016.)
The album’s tone was set by the wistful bookends “A.D. 1928” and “A.D. 1958” — as well as, of course, its final 27 seconds, keyboardist/vocalist Dennis DeYoung’s wonderful Vaudevillian piano outro “State Street Sadie” (a particular favorite track of Lawrence Gowan, Styx’s keyboardist/vocalist since 1999) — all serving to frame a concept album that chronicled the glorious opening and eventual glum closing of a fictional Chicago theater.
“I know exactly physically what building I was in when I wrote that riff for ‘Rockin’ the Paradise,’” says co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young. “I still drive by it sometimes in the south suburbs of Chicago, where we were rehearsing at the time. Tommy came up with the verse, and Dennis came up with the lyrics — and there it was.”
Adds co-founding original bassist Chuck Panozzo, “Paradise Theatre really captured us at our best, when everyone was working towards achieving a common goal. And now I like that we’re able to recreate that feeling of rocking the paradise onstage every night with the people we have in the band.”
Two huge singles emerged from the record. DeYoung’s touchingly reflective “The Best of Times” — JY’s self-admitted favorite DeYoung ballad, in fact — made it all the way to No. 3, and Shaw’s instantly iconic “Too Much Time on My Hands” reached No. 9. “Too Much Time” remains a crowd favorite to this day, and it appears prominently in every single Styx live set. “It was like the song was playing in my head,” Tommy recalls of writing “Too Much Time” on the literal last day of recording for the album. “I heard that riff in my head, but I didn’t have anything to record it on as I was driving to the studio. When I got to the parking lot, I turned the car off, ran inside, got everybody together, and said, ‘Chuck, play this riff, and then do this.’ It was like it came together in a package, and all the pieces were assembled right then and there.”
“Too Much Time on My Hands” has garnered much additional pop-culture cache in the ensuing years. Back in April 2016, for example, Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon began singing snippets of the song during his post-monologue, show-opening desk pieces (“I’ve got the 12 o’clock news blues!”), with house band The Roots picking up the beat to riff on right alongside him. “I was impressed with Jimmy’s vocals — and the band did a fine job on it too,” Tommy told me at the time.
Soon enough, Fallon and his Tonight Show team created a frame-by-frame remake of most of the song’s instant-classic concept video imagery that had made it an unabashed early MTV staple, with Fallon taking on DeYoung’s “vested” role and Paul Rudd (Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania) donning the infamous blue jumpsuit and requisite blonde wig to replicate that perfect of-era Tommy Shaw look. You can see the Fallon/Rudd video homage in a side-by-side comparison with the original clip right here.
Then, in December 2020, and in support of Steelers Nation, our man Shaw — along with fellow current Styx bandmembers JY, Chuck, Lawrence, drummer Todd Sucherman, and bassist Ricky Phillips — took to Zoom to collectively perform an updated remake of the song for our modern times, in a video and audio package produced by the band’s formidable live engineer, Chris “Cookie” Hoff. You can watch that energetic and quite kinetic version of “Too Much Time” on Styx’s official YouTube channel, right here.
Something else Hoff discovered about “Too Much Time” came into play more recently, not long after guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich became a fulltime member of Styx this past year. “Cookie said, ‘If you listen to the original version of “Too Much Time,” there’s some weird, flanged kind of clean guitar part going on,’” Will told me recently on our own Zoom call, then played the song’s signature riff on the guitar he had in his lap to illustrate the point sonically. “And that guitar is playing along with the keyboard! I never really noticed it — but it is with the guitar, so I said, ‘Well, I’ll do that! No one’s doing that, so I’ll do that.’ And once you add that into the live mix, suddenly, it sounds more ‘authentic,’ and more like the original recording.” (It does, indeed — and you can hear Will adding in that extra, sweet guitaristic texture every time “Too Much Time” is now played live onstage.)
Other classic Paradise cuts continue to be performed live by the band, including the aforementioned “Rockin’ the Paradise,” which has since turned into a usually top-hatted Lawrence Gowan performance showcase — and a song that also has the fine distinction of being the 10th video ever shown on MTV on the very day the music channel debuted on U.S. cable systems on August 1, 1981.
“It reminded me of the kind of song Elton John was doing in the early ’70s. That’s how it felt to me, and I fell in love with it immediately,” admits Lawrence. “It’s a dissertation, that lyric. And it’s very uplifting, very positive. Live, it’s an over-the-top performance where I realized, yeah, I could really rev up this character. I’d done a kind of ringmaster-y character myself in the past, and these lyrics fit with that idea. I also thought I might be able to get away with a sequined coat on that one! (chuckles) It’s a song where I’d like to play piano from top to bottom, but the only spot where I can get away with it and still be the showman is in the middle.”
And then there’s “Snowblind,” which had briefly returned to the live set for the first time in a number of years in early 2016 and subsequently became a setlist favorite during Renegades in the Fast Lane, the band's five-show residential run alongside Don Felder, which was held at the Venetian Theatre in Las Vegas between January 6-14, 2017. “Snowblind” also made occasional appearances as part of Styx’s first round of live sets in January 2020 prior to the pandemic, with Young’s effects-laden lead vocal as eerie/creepy as ever, perfectly countered by Shaw’s atmospherically cool wah-wah guitar tone during the “Mirror, mirror” verses. Observes Chuck, “That was the first time I played bass pedals on a song. We were doing some things that really took us out of our comfort zone.” Notes JY, “When you sing the soft parts of a song, you get to hear the crowd singing with you. A number of years ago, when I started singing the line, ‘Mirror, mirror,’ I got to hear the whole place singing along with me for the first time. I had never experienced that before. It was like, ‘Holy crap! This song has touched a lot of people.’ It keeps resonating.”
Incidentally, many astute listeners have observed how the title track of Styx’s June 2021 album Crash of the Crown shares a particular unique element with “Snowblind” in that they both feature more than one Styx bandmember taking lead-vocal turns during the same song — a truly rare occurrence in the Styx canon. To wit: “Snowblind” features JY and Tommy sharing its main vocal duties (i.e., with JY leading the verses, and Tommy leading the choruses), while “Crash” rotates amongst JY on the main verses, Tommy on the stacked-vocal break, and Lawrence taking the final verse home.
The only other “dual” vocal contender in the Styx catalog per se would be “Superstars,” from July 1977’s The Grand Illusion, which features Shaw on lead vocals and DeYoung turning in the spoken word break. That being said, JY, who has been the one to handle the spoken-word portion himself on the rare occasion “Superstars” gets into the live set like it did a few years back, discounts its inclusion in this particularly rare song club since that specific part is spoken and not sung — and who are we to argue with The Godfather of Styx?
On another note, a number of Styx’s contemporaries absolutely love the music of Paradise Theatre — especially when it comes to the aforementioned “Too Much Time on My Hands.” Among the musical admirers of “Too Much Time” whom I’ve personally spoken with include Cheap Trick guitarist Rick Nielsen (“It’s my favorite Styx song”), America co-founder Gerry Beckley (“That’s a great tune!”), and former Chicago bassist/vocalist Jason Scheff (“It really impacted me in the ’80s”). As Sammy Hagar oh-so-succinctly told me about “Too Much Time” in March 2017, “That is my favorite Styx song. Yeah, I really like that song. I like it melodically, and I like the way the riff goes, and the groove. If I ever did do a Styx cover song, that’s the one I’d go ahead and do. That ain’t a B song!”
Styx undertook an extensive international tour quickly following the album’s release in January 1981, encompassing over 100 shows in North America and 14 European gigs, as well as a pair of tour-closing dates at the legendary Budokan in Tokyo, Japan, in January 1982. The Japanese shows are especially notable because the setlist included traditional Japanese songs “Sakura Sakura” and “Sukiyaki,” which featured Tommy playing a koto, a zither-like instrument he bought locally and learned to play in his hotel room. “My most fond memories of Paradise Theatre were when we put it up as a show, and we played it onstage,” Tommy recalls. “I had never seen a backdrop like that — where you’d see one thing when it was lit from the back, and then see something totally different when it was lit from the front. It was just magical.”
One particularly auspicious and serendipitous U.S. performance on the Paradise Theatre Tour took place on August 25, 1981 at the Roanoke Civic Center in Roanoke, Virginia. Not only was that concert the very first Styx show ever attended by yours truly, your trusty Styxologist (see my ticket stub, above!), but it was also attended by Todd Gallopo, the owner and creative director of meat and potatoes – design and branding (all-lowercase letters intended). Gallopo happens to be the man responsible for the album design and visual conceptualization for Styx’s two most recent studio albums — namely, June 2017’s The Mission and June 2021’s Crash of the Crown — as well as other catalog releases in the Styx canon under the Universal/UMe umbrella, including August 2003’s Rockers compilation, May 2004’s Come Sail Away: The Styx Anthology, May 2005’s Big Bang Theory, and June 2021’s The Same Stardust EP.
“My mom and I went to that show in Roanoke, along with my best friend who I played hockey with,” Gallopo told me in May 2019. “It was the first show I ever saw. I don’t have my ticket anymore, but that was the first concert I ever went to. I was way into Styx at the time. I was a young kid playing my own music, and Styx was cool. And that show was also about a week and a half after my birthday. It’s amazing you were there too! Going way back like that, you can see the full circle that happened between Styx and me.” (Without a doubt, brotha Todd — without a doubt!)
On a very-much-related note, another Todd who is vitally important to the world of Styx day in and day out also saw the band play live on that very same tour — namely, drummer Todd Sucherman, who attended a Paradise Theatre show in March 1981 at the Rosemont Horizon in Rosemont, Illinois, which is located just outside of Chicago, his hometown. Fast-forward a full 15 years after that to the date of September 21, 1996 — not only the Autumnal Equinox, but also when Styx’s Return to Paradise reunion tour gig at the very same Rosemont Horizon locale took place. For all 76 dates of that reunion tour, Todd had respectfully taken over the drum chair from co-founding drummer John Panozzo (Chuck’s twin brother), who had fallen gravely ill and sadly passed away in July of that year. “It was amazing to see Styx play there at the Rosemont in 1981 when I was a kid,” Todd told me. “And then getting to play with them on that tour in the same venue in 1996 was exhilarating. That whole tour was really exciting, because you can only have your first time once.” Since that triumphant 1996 tour, Todd has, of course, been Styx’s world-class drummer night in and night out ever since.
Finally, we must share a few words about the album’s initial vinyl release. In that regard, adding to the overall Paradise coolness factor was the laser-etching of the band’s name along with some theater flourishes on the label-less Side 2. “That was done to thwart bootleggers, which was a big problem back then,” reveals Tommy. (These etchings can also be found on some, though not all, subsequent Paradise Theatre vinyl reissues — so if you’re looking into buying a used and/or vintage copy, always check for the etching to ensure you’re getting the exact right version you want!)
The 42 years since Paradise Theatre first graced our presence at times seems to have come and gone in a flash — but all of this wonderfully majestic detail, of course, serves well to keep alive the memories of Paradise. We all trust you’ll enjoy rediscovering it for yourselves.
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Sweet, sweet sounds fill the air: Join us in our celebration of Styx’s mighty Equinox, which was released 47 years ago today on December 1, 1975.
by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Equinox, Styx’s fifth studio album, was released 47 years ago today on December 1, 1975. Equinox was also the band’s first album on a major label, A&M Records, opening the door for their subsequent, best-selling international success. (Under their original recording contract, Styx’s first four LPs were released on Wooden Nickel Records, a Chicago-based independent record label.)
Equinox ultimately reached No. 58 on the Billboard 200 albums chart in 1976, and has since been certified by the RIAA as achieving Gold status, or 500,000 copies sold. (We here at Styxworld demand an immediate recertification to bring Equinox up to what we truly believe is its fully deserved and justified platinum-selling status, STAT!) The album’s lone single, “Lorelei,” reached No. 36 in the U.S. and No. 6 in Canada, also in 1976.
Right out of the gate, Equinox's lead track, “Light Up,” fused Styx’s best instincts for how to blend harmonies, keyboard hooks, and power chords together to memorable effect, resulting in a song that continues to grace many of Styx’s live setlists (usually accompanied with a quite incredible audience-generated visual effect to boot). Two other hard-driving singalong Equinox songs, “Lorelei” and “Suite Madame Blue,” are also in regular live rotation.
For the record, as of this posting, “Suite Madame Blue” leads the Equinox streaming pack on Spotify with 5.6 million listens followed closely by “Lorelei” at 5.1 million, while “Light Up” currently stands at 1.7 million.
“Equinox really was the start of some great records for A&M,” says Styx co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young, the man who now takes “Lorelei” to new lead-vocal heights whenever it’s part of the band’s live set. “We had an evolved sense of who we were, and what we could accomplish. And our goals were then set that much higher. In the context of Styx, I think it all came together on that record.”
In the wake of the album’s release, however, Styx also had to deal with an impending personnel change. “The first time I ever heard anything from Equinox was at my audition for the band in Chicago,” clarifies guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw, who joined Styx on December 12, 1975 — less than two weeks after the album’s release date! — right as the band was set to go out on tour. Tommy came on up from his homebase in Montgomery, Alabama in order to replace then recently departed guitarist/vocalist John “JC” Curulewski, an original Styx bandmember. “The first thing I heard,” Tommy continues, “was JY singing ‘Midnight Ride,’ which just blew me away.” (Oh, if only we could all hear “Midnight Ride” grace some future Styx sets. . . paging JY!!)
JY points out that, after having cut November 1974’s Man of Miracles at Golden Voice Studios in South Pekin, Illinois on a budget, recording Equinox at Paragon Studios in Chicago with ace producer Barry Mraz at the controls was clear evidence things had already very much changed for Styx. “We went in there with tremendous confidence of our own validity, and I think the album sounds like it,” JY reports. “For one thing, it was the first time I played a Marshall amplifier, ever, in the studio. I always wanted to sound like The Who — and to me, this is the album that really sounds like The Who. ‘Lorelei’ — you can totally hear The Who there. ‘Light Up’ — [original keyboardist/vocalist] Dennis DeYoung gets the credit for this [JY hums the song’s signature keyboard-and-guitar intro], but adding the power chords between the phrases is something [legendary Who guitarist Pete] Townshend trademarked. Thank you, Pete! We happily lifted that.”
Coming on the heels of the aforementioned Man of Miracles, Equinox truly set the template for where Styx was going next. “Man of Miracles is raw Styx,” observes Tommy. “I’d listened to that stuff and I knew it was raw, rocking, and melodic. But Equinox was refined. Styx had just evolved. From writing to performing to making records — everything just really fell into place on that record. ‘Lonely Child’ and ‘Mother Dear,’ ‘Prelude 12’ and ‘Suite Madame Blue’ — it was all just very daring, and you didn’t know what was coming next, from ‘Midnight Ride’ to ‘Suite Madame Blue.’ There weren’t that many songs on the record [in fact, there’s only eight of them], but they were all big songs.”
The album’s cover art was also very important in making a statement about Styx’s ongoing evolution. “On the cover, you see the cube in the fire, and I really, really liked it because it was transitional,” admits Styx co-founding bassist Chuck Panozzo. “And equinox can also mean the change between seasons, which I like too. Equinox left me with a good feeling about where we were going as a band. We, as musicians, were becoming extremely professional about what we were doing. It was one of those life-changing events. You could feel it — even if you didn’t know exactly what was coming.”
Incidentally, if you think the enigmatic “The Age of Entropia,” one of the two exclusive studio tracks that appears on Side 1 of Styx’s June 2021 Record Store Day EP The Same Stardust, feels like it could have in fact been a long lost Equinox outtake, you wouldn’t be that far off the mark. “I totally agree,” concurs Will Evankovich, the co-author of “Entropia” along with Tommy Shaw who served as the EP’s studio tracks producer (and who is also the most recently anointed fulltime Styx bandmember). Continues Will, “You’re absolutely right. ‘Entropia’ does have some Equinox feel to it. It’s in 6/8 with minor arpeggios, and it is its own animal.” (Now you know!)
Canada actually embraced Equinox somewhat earlier than the United States did, a phenomenon not lost on longtime Canadian resident and Styx keyboardist/vocalist for the past 23 years and counting, Lawrence Gowan. “Well, ‘Lorelei’ was on Canadian radio, and that’s where I first became aware of the band,” confirms Gowan, who joined Styx in 1999. “In Ontario, we didn’t have ‘Suite Madame Blue’ — we had ‘Lorelei.’ And when I heard it, I remember going, ‘Oh, what band is this?’ — because I thought they were British. I was into anything that had synthesizer on it from that era, and I had just started learning the names of synthesizers then. So about ‘Lorelei,’ I’d go, ‘That sounds like the ARP 2500 that was on The Who’s ‘Baba O’Riley.’” (There’s that Who connection again. . .)
Continues Gowan, “When ‘Lorelei’ came on the radio, I really liked it right off the bat. I thought, ‘Hmmm!’ And when I found out they were American, I thought, ‘That’s the first progressive rock band not from the U.K. to suddenly be noticed.’ And,” Gowan adds with his signature mischievous chuckle, “I had a feeling I better learn these songs, because (slight pause) . . . you never know.”
You never know indeed. And now, during many an exciting extended-set Styx live gig, you can hear Mr. Gowan take full charge of “Suite Madame Blue” as he moves from behind his keyboard to the top of the elevated stage perch positioned up behind drummer Todd Sucherman, with full, rich harmonies in tow by all other singing Styx members, including JY, Tommy, bassist Ricky Phillips, and guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich. So light up, everybody, and keep basking in the that eternal ice-fire glow that Equinox provides upon each and every listen.
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Leon’s ‘Man of Miracles’ story:
Man of Miracles / The Wizard – Hypergallery
Leon and Hypergallery Q&A:
Q&A / Leon Rosenblatt – Hypergallery
Leon artist profile:
Leon Rosenblatt – Hypergallery
The print:
Leon Rosenblatt – Hypergallery
On Behalf of Charlie Brusco, the Styx Band and Crew, and the Red Light Management Atlanta Office:
To all family, friends, and associates of the Styx Family,
It is with a heavy heart that we share the news with you that Susan Young passed away on November 10, 2022. She passed away peacefully at home with her devoted husband of 50 years, James ”JY” Young, by her side.
Susie was a tireless advocate for her husband’s rock n’ roll career in the band Styx. She often spent years on end traveling with him and the Styx team on the road so they could be together. She was a constant source of encouragement and ”wardrobe suggestions.” JY and Susie were truly inseparable.
Susie was beloved by all and will always be remembered.
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by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Man of Miracles, Styx’s fourth studio album, was released 48 years ago today by Wooden Nickel Records on November 8, 1974. Man of Miracles was the band’s final album under their original contract with Wooden Nickel, the Chicago-based independent record label, before they moved into the big leagues with noted major label A&M Records for an impressive run of releases that started with December 1975’s Equinox — the first album wherein Styx found their true, collective studio acumen and songwriting footing.
Man of Miracles — which was named, as many Styx albums have been, by co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young — showed the band beginning to stretch their creative muscles even further in the studio, albeit with their fair share of hits and misses. Miracles was recorded at Golden Voice Studios in South Pekin, Illinois, and remixed at Paragon Recording Studios in Chicago. It was produced by John Ryan for Chicago Kid Productions in cooperation with Bill Traut and engineered by Gary Loizzo. Loizzo went on to engineer and co-produce a good number of the band’s subsequent albums and later served as their longtime live engineer, right up until his passing in January 2016.
Miracles ultimately peaked at No. 154 on Billboard’s Top 200 Albums chart, which was 38 positions higher than where their previous album, October 1973’s The Serpent Is Rising, had landed.
“I love the opulence of the title song,” notes original, co-founding Styx bassist Chuck Panozzo about the ever-soaring “Man of Miracles” (which appears as the last track on Side 2 of the album in its vinyl form). He then pauses to sing the main harmonic line from the chorus before adding, “Critics may have called it ‘pomp rock,’ but, well, I’m sorry — we’re musicians, and we wanted to use our skills to make sounds that were all our own.” (Hear, hear, Chuckie!!!)
In addition to the uplifting title track, Miracles boasted one other bonafide FM radio favorite: John “JC” Curulewski and JY’s album-opening co-write, “Rock & Roll Feeling” — a song that also features the quite-telling lyric, “But I can’t play no nine-to-five game / Hanging loose is all I know.” Incidentally, “R&RF” continues to be the most-played song from Man of Miracles on Spotify, with a tally of over 595,000 digital spins to date, and counting.
“‘Rock & Roll Feeling’ was a BTO kind of hit,” observes JY. “It has a strong hook and that driving, Bachman-Turner Overdrive kind of feel. I got robbed on that record because ‘Lady’ obliterated it on the charts, so there went my big chance of writing a hit single!” he exclaims with a laugh, referring to the quite popular, late-blooming single from July 1973’s Styx II that garnered Styx their most consistent airplay in both their pre- and early-A&M days — and a song that remains in the band’s setlist to this day (sung with great aplomb, and properly enhanced with a quite expressive stage presence, by vocalist/keyboardist Lawrence Gowan). “But as a big-picture guy, I saw which way the wind was blowing,” JY concludes, “so there was very little point of me trying to contradict it.”
Incidentally, there’s more than one version of Miracles available in the marketplace. For example, on the subsequent RCA pressing of the vinyl LP, Styx’s energetic cover of The Knickerbockers' Beatlesque 1965 Top 20 hit single “Lies” was replaced at the start of Side 2 by JY and Dennis DeYoung’s “Best Thing,” a track originally found on the band’s self-titled August 1972 debut album. Why did they wind up doing “Lies” in the first place, I ask JY. “There was no single on that album,” he replies, “and they [i.e., Wooden Nickel Records] said we needed to do something to fix that.” (Record companies always wanted to chase that mythical hit single, didn’t they?)
Not only that, but the 1980 RCA cartoon-cover reissue of the album — simply renamed Miracles — replaced “Best Thing” with DeYoung and Chuck Lofrano’s “Unfinished Song,” a track that later appeared on The Complete Wooden Nickel Recordings double CD featuring Styx’s first four Wooden Nickel albums in full, which was released by Hip-O Records/UMe in February 2005. (Can’t tell your Miracles without a scorecard, apparently. . .)
The striking, painted Miracles cover art by Leon Rosenblatt (ID’ed as “Lee” on the back cover) is of a white-bearded grand wizard, seen manipulating by hand and/or other mystical forces the planet Saturn and an array of six of its moons. This iconic design later made a callback/comeback of sorts as the main image on the front of a powder-blue t-shirt sold at the band’s official merch table during their 2013-14 North American Tour (which your trusty Styxologist happens to be wearing today as he writes this, in honor of such a hallowed anniversary). And if you look ever-so-closely, you may continue to find the Miracles wizard in the background of some other more recent, official 50th-anniversary Styx t-shirt designs — so happy oracle hunting!
He was a man of miracles, riding golden meteorites. . .
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by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Cornerstone, Styx’s ninth studio album, was released 43 years ago today by A&M Records on October 19, 1979. Cornerstone was the band’s third triple-platinum-selling album in a row — cementing Styx as the first band ever to have achieved that vaunted sales feat (with their fourth one, Paradise Theatre, to follow just two years later) — and it also spawned their first No. 1 single, “Babe.” That intimate, Dennis DeYoung-penned ballad reached the pinnacle of the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart for two weeks in December 1979 (specifically, on the charts dated December 8 and December 15). The album itself peaked at No. 2 on Billboard’s Top 200 Albums chart.
Cornerstone — an album referred to by keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan as being a “pillar” of the band’s “Big Four” albums (the other three being July 1977’s The Grand Illusion, September 1978’s Pieces of Eight, and January 1981’s aforementioned Paradise Theatre) — contains a number of key tracks in the Styx oeuvre. Guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw’s mandolin-driven “Boat on the River” is, in fact, the band’s biggest hit internationally, having topped the charts in Switzerland and reaching the Top 5 in countries like Germany, Austria, and the Netherlands — not to mention it becoming a key track on Sing for the Day!, Tommy’s live solo release from June 2018 on which he was backed by the Contemporary Youth Orchestra. Believe it or not, “Boat on the River” also happens to be the band’s most-covered track, with many of its cover versions having been done in languages other than English. “It still amazes me how much impact that song has had on people over the years, and how far and wide it has reached all over the globe,” Tommy admits.
For “Boat on the River,” co-founding bassist Chuck Panozzo tried something new by playing a bowed, stand-up double bass. “It was something I hadn’t done before in the studio,” Chuck recounts. “Some people were skeptical about it, but that wasn’t going to stop me from trying it. I thought it was the right thing to do for the song — and I think it worked out perfectly.” Someone who particularly admires Chuck’s work on “Boat” is the newest fulltime member of Styx, guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich, who got to perform a special orchestrated version of the song alongside Tommy during that above-noted Sing for the Day! concert. “I’m a huge fan of Chuck’s isolated bowed tracks on that song,” admits Will, who’s personally studied the original master recording firsthand in much detail.
The album’s vibrant lead track, Tommy’s ever-uplifting “Lights,” has often served as a welcome staple in the back half of Styx’s extended live sets — and it was also a standing favorite for Gary Loizzo, the band’s longtime live engineer and studio co-producer who passed away in January 2016. In recent years, the live version of “Lights” features an original percussion intro written and performed by drummer Todd Sucherman, along with Tommy on acoustic guitar throughout the entire song and co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young replicating the Ed Tossing-arranged middle horn section from the studio version on his electric guitar.
Cornerstone was recorded at Loizzo’s own Pumpkin Studios in Oak Lawn, Illinois. “For me, Cornerstone was one of those albums that went together very well,” Loizzo told me in 2015. “I was very hard on Johnny [i.e., John Panozzo, Styx’s original drummer, who passed away in July 1996] because I made him play nothing but foot, snare, and kick on a couple of tracks, and then he’d have to go and overdub the toms and other stuff. Sometimes, the sound itself isn’t the most important thing — you’ve also gotta get the feel.”
The album title came courtesy of JY, the man who also named Man of Miracles and Equinox. Cornerstone’s stunning artwork, which features a barn-door opening down the middle of the back cover that opens up to printed lyrics on both interior half-sides in addition to a shiny, futuristic silver LP sleeve, was designed by Mick Haggerty. (Unfortunately, some of the latter-day LP reissues do not include that way-cool barn-door option, such as the version of Cornerstone that’s included in The A&M Albums – 1975-1984 vinyl box set.)
While most of the attention given to Cornerstone continues to spotlight Side 1, lyrics from key Side 2 tracks like Tommy’s album-closer, “Love in the Midnight,” have occasionally been sung by its author before he’ll launch into other songs acoustically onstage. Meanwhile, the hard-charging “Borrowed Time” (the album’s second single, which reached No. 64 on the charts) has been discussed only in passing as a song that might be revisited live someday. (So, guys . . . how about working it up for some of the longer sets in 2023, a.k.a. Year 51?)
Finally, on those occasions whenever I, your trusty Styxologist, suggest to JY that I’d love to hear his pleading “Eddie” find its way into the set — somewhat of a ritualistic request of mine, especially when we’re on the road together for any extended periods of time — he will often give me a patented JY look and reply with something along the lines of, “You might have to wait on that!” before taking a beat to add the final kicker: “But I’d keep it in the original key.” (I think the message is ever so loud and clear, indeed. . .)
Cornerstone remains a strong pillar in Styx’s recorded legacy, and it’s an album worth revisiting via its finely remastered vinyl form. And all roads lead to tranquility base. . .
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by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Crystal Ball, Styx’s sixth studio album and the band’s first to feature Tommy Shaw on guitar and vocals, was released 46 years ago today on October 1, 1976. Recorded at Paragon Studios in Chicago and produced by Styx with assistance from Barry Mraz, Crystal Ball reached No. 66 on the Pop Albums chart. Crystal Ball has long been certified as Gold by the RIAA (which translates to sales of over 500,000 copies), but considering how long ago that particular certification was done — i.e., in the pre-CD, pre-download, and pre-streaming era! — it’s much more than likely to have surpassed the million-selling mark at this point (if not well beyond it, don’tcha think!).
Meanwhile, “Mademoiselle,” with lead vocals from Shaw, was released as the album’s lead and only single, and it managed to reach No. 36 on the Pop Singles chart. (Needless to say, the song remains both a band and fan favorite to this day.)
“We knew right away Tommy was a superstar,” says co-founding Styx bassist Chuck Panozzo about Shaw, his longtime stage and studio compatriot. “His songwriting, playing, and singing on Crystal Ball immediately elevated the band.” Chuck then concludes, with a laugh, “And he’s a pretty decent-looking guy too.”
Tommy had been recruited to replace original Styx guitarist/vocalist John “J.C.” Curulewski once the tour to support the band’s fifth album, Equinox, got underway in December 1975 (the same month that historic album was released, in fact). As recording commenced in Chicago for the band’s next album in 1976, Shaw reached back to his MS Funk days to emerge with key elements for songs like the quite apropos uplifting album opener “Put Me On” and the “Crystal Ball” title track itself — the latter of which, as Tommy himself notes, “was a song I was playing in my $200-a-week bowling alley gig back in Montgomery, Alabama. It came to me pretty much all at once one time when I was visiting my mama at home.”
On numerous Styx tours during his folksy, spoken-word intros to “Crystal Ball” — i.e., right in those intimate moments before he strums the song’s iconic opening notes on a certain acoustic guitar — Tommy has often affirmed that he brought the track with him when he first traveled up to Chicago for his band audition.
Co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young, who was instrumental in helping Shaw and the band collectively “Styxify” the aforementioned title track, understands the song’s ongoing deep resonance. “I have a lot of people come up to me and say ‘Crystal Ball’ is their favorite Styx song. It seems to have an added layer of importance today with all the uncertainty in the world — especially with people who are searching for deeper meaning in their own lives,” observes the always-on-point Godfather of Styx.
As such, “Crystal Ball” remains an important fixture in the majority of the band’s live sets to this very day. Tommy has also more often than not resurrected some of the lyrics that were edited out of the original recorded version of the song, which instead now serve as its live acoustic coda — so keep an ear out for them if you get to see Styx live anytime soon, as you might just be surprised at what you may hear!
Otherwise, you can see an example of exactly how Tommy adds those long-lost lyrics back into the track during his solo performance of “Crystal Ball” with the Contemporary Youth Orchestra (CYO) — while seated right next to newest Styx bandmember, guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich, no less — on the Sing for the Day! Blu-ray/DVD release, which was recorded in Cleveland back on May 27, 2016 (a show yours truly happily attended in person, and totally thoroughly enjoyed). Sing for the Day!, which is also available on CD and digital platforms, was released by Eagle Rock Entertainment on June 29, 2018.
For his part, Evankovich, who now gets to play “Crystal Ball” onstage with all of Styx after having joined the band fulltime in the summer of 2021, respects how the song’s throughline of questioning one’s own purpose, direction, and sense of self are among the core themes Shaw handles oh-so-deftly as an observant and insightful songwriter. “Tommy is that guy, you know? He’s always on the existential precipice,” Will observes. “He’s just like the rest of us. I mean, what are you thinking about at two in the morning? What do you worry about? Do you worry too much? Are you asking the anti-logical questions of why we exist? What is this all for? I really like how he does it in his songs — and he also does it in a way where the average person can totally relate.”
Even more recently, Heart co-founding guitarist/vocalist Nancy Wilson was more than happy to join Styx onstage to both play and sing on “Crystal Ball” as a special guest during Styx’s residency at The Venetian in Las Vegas on January 28-29 and February 2, 4, and 5, 2022. “I really, really love that song,” Nancy told me personally, long before those five Venetian dates had even been announced, let alone planned. “I grew up in the same era as Tommy and Styx did, and they’ve written so many beautiful, great songs I would always hear on the radio. I really admire that kind of writing, playing, and singing.” Will Nancy once again join Tommy and the guys onstage for “Crystal Ball” during their upcoming live dates together in Western Canada here in October? Only one way to find out. . .
One other such notable lifelong fan of “Crystal Ball” of note is Loverboy lead singer Mike Reno. “It’s one of my favorite songs,” readily admits Reno, whose band spent the bulk of this past summer opening for Styx and REO Speedwagon on their highly successful 45-date Live & UnZoomed Tour. “That song is a total inspiration to me. When I was living in Calgary and playing in a bar band, I was hoping I could be like Styx someday and write songs that good myself. And now I’m proud to call Tommy my friend.”
Elsewhere on Crystal Ball, keyboardist/vocalist Dennis DeYoung masterfully performs French composer Claude Debussy’s impressionistic 1890 instrumental “Clair de Lune” (which translates to “moonlight,” and was further inspired by French poet Paul Verlaine’s 1869 poem of the same name) on piano as the intro to the album’s final heartfelt track on Side 2, “Ballerina,” a song that immediately follows “This Old Man,” a poignant tribute to DeYoung’s father.
The beginning of Side 2 actually gets ushered in with “Shooz,” a catchy finger-snapper of a track featuring some Southern-flare slide guitar courtesy of Alabama native Shaw, as counterbalanced by JY’s patented Hendrixian fire. “I think they were only going to let me have one of those moments on the album,” recalls Tommy with a chuckle. Adds JY, “I do love The Allman Brothers. I’m not sure if we did them justice, but that was our attempt to go there. Our style had already been established, but Tommy was known for doing that kind of stuff in the clubs. I actually hoped we could have moved the band more in that direction."
By the way, if you too want more Allman Brothers joy in your Styx life, just check out the band’s scorching cover of the ABB’s indelibly pleading “One Way Out” on May 2005’s Big Bang Theory, which features Tommy on lead vocals, tearing it up like only he can. In addition to that, you can further access that instantly identifiable Allmansesque vibe during those special moments onstage when Tommy and JY play certain tasty riffs in tandem together on “Man in the Wilderness” and “Radio Silence” — whenever those two classic songs appear in the setlist, that is.
In the meantime, as we collectively celebrate this wonderful album’s magical 46th anniversary, we invite you all to please enjoy the many aural gifts Crystal Ball continues to offer with every successive spin. There are so many things I need to know. . .
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by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Styx’s mega-triple-platinum smash success Pieces of Eight was released 44 years ago today by A&M Records on September 1, 1978. Featuring a stunning cover design by Hipgnosis — the British company known for creating instantly memorable album-package artwork for Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, UFO, 10cc, and scores of other bands — Pieces of Eight become the second of ultimately four consecutive Styx albums to sell more than three million copies apiece, the first time any band in rock history had ever done so. (Since the RIAA’s three-times-platinum certification for Pieces of Eight was done quite a number of years ago, we suspect the album has sold many, many more copies in the interim, wouldn’t you agree?)
Just as on the band’s previous album, July 1977’s The Grand Illusion, Pieces of Eight’s overall production credit was again given to the entire band (“Produced by Styx”), with engineering by longtime collaborators Barry Mraz and Rob Kingsland. Po8 was recorded at Paragon Studios in Chicago.
Pieces of Eight reached as high as No. 6 on the Billboard Top 200 Albums chart and boasted three hit singles, all penned by guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw. To wit: “Blue Collar Man (Long Nights)” reached No. 21, “Sing for the Day” got to No. 41, and “Renegade” made it all the way to No. 16.
Pieces of Eight features many key tracks in the Styx canon that remain staples in the band’s regular live set. For example, there’s the aforementioned and always hard-charging “Blue Collar Man,” the show’s onetime bring-it-on-home song that has since been vaulted up to the second position in the beginning of the set following “The Fight of Our Lives,” the elegiac, kickoff table-setter from June 2021’s Crash of the Crown. In recent years, “Blue Collar Man” has also been sung more like the original recording after Tommy went back and listened to it as a personal refresher.
Then there’s “Pieces of Eight,” which, when it makes its occasional appearance during the first set of some of Styx’s longer, two-set shows — something that happened a number of times in early-2022 shows prior to the current Live & UnZoomed summer tour, and will likely reappear again in the fall — is yet another ivory-tickling set highlight for keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan. And then there’s “Sing for the Day,” an acoustic-driven treasure that also served as the title for Tommy’s May 27, 2016 solo show with the Contemporary Youth Orchestra in Cleveland and was released on Blu-ray and CD by Eagle Rock on June 29, 2018.
Of course, it almost goes without saying we also have the cream of the crop that closes every single Styx live set — namely, “Renegade,” the eternal barnburner that gained additional life not only as a fourth-quarter rallying cry for the Pittsburgh Steelers (more on that in just a bit!) but it also served as a) the theme for Season 2 of the quite intense Netflix drama Narcos back in 2016, and b) was a key track utilized for the back half of the final episodes of Season 4 of the acclaimed, Emmy-nominated Netflix drama Ozark that were first made available for viewing in April 2022. (More on both of these special “Renegade” show placements later in the story.)
Me, I’m also partial to the Gowan-sung version of “Queen of Spades,” which appears in 2011’s two-disc Regeneration collection. (His unbridled cackle before the line, “You lose!” is simply priceless.) And, as many of you will recall, Styx performed all of Pieces of Eight (the first Styx album your humble Styxologist ever bought back in 1978, in fact!) alongside 1977’s epic The Grand Illusion on tour for a few select dates in 2010. This special two-fer show can be found on Eagle Rock’s live CD, DVD, and/or Blu-ray set, The Grand Illusion/Pieces of Eight Live.
PO GOT YOU COVERED
Incidentally, the design and positioning of the “mature” female heads on the Po8 cover itself is patterned after the monolithic stone statues that appear all throughout Easter Island in the Valparaiso region of Chile. The statues were carved by the island’s native Polynesian inhabitants, the Rapa Nui.
How the album’s truly mystical design came about is a story best told by the creative director of Hipgnosis himself, Aubrey “Po” Powell — who gave yours truly, your resident Styxologist, all the details about it from across the Pond in a Styxworld-exclusive conversation just for this posting. “It was intended to be as radically different as possible,” Powell told me. “When we thought of the idea of Pieces of Eight, automatically, in England, you think of treasure — doubloons, and other stuff pirates would have like that — so we wanted to move as far away from that as possible. I remember we were sitting around thinking of ideas, and Storm [Thorgerson, Powell’s late Hipgnosis partner and master designer] suddenly said, ‘Why don’t we create something like a strange cocktail party with a housewives-from-Phoenix kind of context?’ And then it went from there. ‘Why don’t we shoot the background on Easter Island?’ I was actually going to go to Easter Island and shoot it for real, but in those days, it was very difficult to get there. So, we decided to create a collage of these very conservative, upmarket, rich women attending a cocktail party. All the women at the cocktail party were very carefully chosen for their elegance and their age — and they all had to be wearing those Aku-Aku earrings, like the Aku-Akus that were on the island behind them.”
Powell readily admits the Pieces of Eight layout was a “high concept” design idea to the hilt. “If you said to me, ‘What relevance does that have to Styx, or the music?’ — I would have to say, ‘Very little.’ It’s just an image that’s hopefully impactful enough that people should take note of,” he points out.
Many people did indeed take notice of the Po8 album’s striking cover art — and that was entirely the point. “At that time in the ’70s, in the record emporiums like Tower Records and other places like that, there’d be something like 10,000 albums in there, so you wanted to create something that was a little different,” Powell explains. “When an album like Pieces of Eight went up on the wall, it would garner people’s attention. They’d be wondering, ‘What is that? What’s going on there? What is the story behind it?’ That was our exact intention.”
How did Styx react when the cover art was first presented to them? “They recorded Pieces of Eight in Chicago, and I flew to Chicago to go and see them, which was Storm’s idea,” Powell recalls. “I remember taking several ideas to show the band, and that was the one they all went on about immediately — ‘Yeah, I love that; we love that! Let’s use it.’ Why? Because it was telling a story, and Styx often told stories in their lyrics.”
INSIDE THE Po8 SONGS
As to the music on Pieces of Eight itself, Toto guitarist/vocalist Steve Lukather cites “Blue Collar Man” as long being his favorite Styx song by telling me, “They write really well-crafted songs. They’re a solid band, you know? They’re really good live — and that’s how you know it’s the real thing.” (Naturally, we here at Styxworld agree with this assessment from the guitar maestro known by some as Cool Hand Luke.)
Though many people assume “Sing for the Day” was named after Tommy’s daughter Hannah Shaw — a.k.a. “The Kitten Lady,” who became a New York Times bestselling author with her August 2019 debut tome, Tiny But Mighty: Kitten Lady’s Guide to Saving the Most Vulnerable Felines — she was in fact born in 1987, a full nine years after the Po8 album was released. The “Hannah” whom Tommy namechecks throughout the song is meant to be the representative embodiment of the mutual respect between the band and their substantive female following.
And in case you were wondering, the absolutely brilliant pipe-organ solo performed by keyboardist/vocalist Dennis DeYoung in the middle of “I’m O.K.” was recorded at the St. James Cathedral, which is located at the corner of Huron and Wabash Streets in Chicago. It is the oldest Episcopal Church in the United States, having been founded in 1834 and completed in 1857.
THE RENEGADE WHO HAD IT MADE
Concerning “Renegade,” which is among its author’s most well-known and most loved songs, Tommy Shaw told me, “I wrote that song in my living room on my piano back when I lived in Michigan. Nobody else was around, and for it to become something that Steelers players and fans love — and also become a part of a few shows I’ve enjoyed watching — is so surreal to me! I’m so grateful for how much it means to our own fans, and how it endures to this day.”
More recently, “Renegade” factored into the second half of Ozark’s fourth and final season in April 2022 in two pivotal ways: 1) via a somewhat recast excerpt of the song in the trailer for Season 4’s final seven eps, and 2) how the song itself plays an extended key role in a pair of scenes at the very outset of the second-to-last episode, S4 Ep13, “Mud.” As Tommy told me back in May, “Hearing ‘Renegade’ in the most anticipated season of Ozark was great news. And when I heard the way they had used the bits and pieces in the trailer, we were all blown away. We’ll be watching!”
Meanwhile, co-founding Styx guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young revealed to me the secret to all those scorching riffs he plays on the song: “To me, it’s Jeff Beck 101,” JY observed. “As far as the guitar solo goes, it took me all day to do it. I used my old ’65 Stratocaster, which had not really been modified in any way at that point in time, played through the Yoshinarator into a Marshall stack, as recorded by Barry Mraz.” [Said Yoshinarator preamp/distortion unit was custom-built for JY and designed around his ’65 Strat by Dave Yoshinari, a friend of his with whom he attended the Illinois Institute of Technology way back in the day.]
Or, as the 2021-anointed, now fulltime Styx bandmember guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich put it, “Oh God — that’s the Holy Grail right there, isn’t it?” And Will would certainly know of what he speaks firsthand, considering how he gets to play and sing on “Renegade” himself during every live Styx set moving forward. Not only that, but Will also a) co-engineered and co-produced Tommy’s vocals and guitars on the Regeneration Volume II version of “Renegade” that were done at The Shop in Los Angeles back in 2010, and b) played acoustically and sang on the song right alongside his partner in songwriting during Tommy’s aforementioned Sing for the Day! event.
HERE WE GO STEELERS
Since January 2002, the Pittsburgh Steelers have regularly shown a video compilation of its mighty defense in action with “Renegade” as the soundtrack on the JumboTron at Acrisure Stadium (formerly known as Heinz Field) whenever the team needs a boost, usually (read: always) in the fourth quarter.
Regarding the ongoing impact of “Renegade,” Hall of Famer left outside linebacker Kevin Greene (shown above) said to me a few years ago, “That’s a Steelers song. I hate to ‘claim’ that one, but it is a Steelers song. It’s an ass-kicking song, and it just really speaks to the Steelers and the steel-mill-town mentality. You know, we are renegades, we are long hair, we’re out there being wild and free and having fun and kicking people’s asses!” (Sadly, Greene passed away at age 58 on December 21, 2020.)
Added Hall of Fame running back Jerome “The Bus” Bettis, “As a football player from Pittsburgh, I just wanted to let those guys in Styx know how important ‘Renegade’ was to me as a player — and the fact that they allowed us to play that song, because it brought us so much joy. But it also brought some wins. It helped the defense pick it up. It made a difference with us, and those guys need to hear it from me how important that was.”
Steelers-players-sent messages duly received by “Renegade” songwriter Tommy Shaw, by the way, who responds: “I’m completely blown away by hearing this!”
“Renegade” was also covered in fine kickass fashion in 2017 by Shallow Side, a now-established down-home rock band from Tommy’s home state of Alabama. “It’s one of those songs that, when you play it and you’re nailing it and everyone’s on their spots, you can just feel it,” noted Shallow Side vocalist Eric Boatright of the track that appears on their January 2017 release, One. “The emotions surrounding it when we were doing it had that same vibe, so that’s where we were coming from. We wanted to make it our own and add a newer vibe to it, and bring some of the new age of rock & roll to it, right there where it left off.”
Songwriter Shaw wholly approves: “I’m impressed by those guys. Good arrangement, good performance, good video. By far, this is my favorite cover of ‘Renegade.’ Everyone in the band really liked it too. We love the song, love the video, and think the band has a great vibe. They seem like the real deal. They’ve got soul.”
And with that fine final sentiment, we now say to one and all — please join us in celebrating the 44th anniversary of this most wonderfully endearing and eternally enduring album in the Styx recorded canon by spinning Pieces of Eight right along with today. Say it with me together now, won’t you: “Oh, Mama!!”
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by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
band photos by Jason Powell
Come on in and see what’s happening: Styx’s biggest-selling album, The Grand Illusion, was released 45 years ago today by A&M Records on the cosmically cool stardate of July 7, 1977 — or, as it’s better known on the back of many a favorite Styx t-shirt, 7/7/77.
Demo’ed at S.I.R. Rehearsal Studios and ultimately recorded at Paragon Recording Studios in Chicago in early 1977, The Grand Illusion was engineered by Barry Mraz and Rob Kingsland, but the overall production credit was given to the entire band in the liner notes as simply, “Produced by Styx.”
The Grand Illusion reached as high as No. 6 on the Billboard Top 200 albums chart, and it spawned two Top 30 singles — 1) “Come Sail Away,” which reached No. 8, and 2) “Fooling Yourself,” which reached No. 29. The album has since been certified triple platinum by the RIAA for selling over 3 million copies. (That said, since we all believe GI has likely sold well over 6 million copies to date — and at least 1 million of them on 8-track tape, as co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young often noted onstage prior to singing “Miss America” — we once again demand a re-certification!)
The Grand Illusion also holds the distinction of being the first entry in the band’s groundbreaking string of releasing four multiplatinum albums in a row — a feat no other band had ever done before, in fact. And in case you’re wondering, the album’s iconic cover art by Alton Kelley and Stanley Mouse is modeled after Belgian surrealist René Magritte’s 1965 piece titled Le Blanc Seing, a.k.a. The Blank Check.
Styx played The Grand Illusion in its entirety when it was paired with Pieces of Eight on a 2010 tour that’s since been commemorated on CD, DVD, and Blu-ray. Its core songs remain as indelible fixtures in the band’s live set — and if Styx is doing one of their longer, two-set shows, that set will often feature other sweet Illusion gems like “Miss America” and “Man in the Wilderness.” The latter track is a particular favorite of mine — as well as of Tommy Shaw’s guitar tech Scott Rottler, who assists Tommy with the acoustic-to-electric guitar switch-off in the middle of “Wilderness” whenever it’s performed live. “It’s phenomenal,” Scotty told me recently, when we touched on the impact “Wilderness” continues to have on the both of us. “Just the fact that Tommy can hit some of those high notes he wrote decades ago blows my mind! And there’s something about that solo he goes into, too. When he switches from the acoustic, where it’s a little more stripped-down and personal, and then he goes into this solo that just rips your face off — that’s when the song rises to a whole other level.” (No arguments here!)
As noted, three of the album’s core songs appear in every Styx show: 1) the title track, “The Grand Illusion,” which is usually the second song performed just about every night and is sung with much aplomb and panache by keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan; 2) “Fooling Yourself,” which, if he’s in the house that night, will also feature original bassist Chuck Panozzo playing on the entire track and taking its brief but iconic bass break the moment Tommy Shaw calls out, “Chuckie!”; and 3) “Come Sail Away,” which closes every main set with great cosmic bombast, and, at the song’s conclusion — if you’re lucky, and if the venue at hand allows it in these post-pandemic times — also features cannons releasing lots and lots of confetti into and onto the audience from either side of the stage. (Show of hands, how many of you have some of said confetti and/or streamers still in your possession — yep, me too!)
As easy as it is to sing along to, “Fooling Yourself” is actually one of the most complex musical pieces Styx has ever composed. To get somewhat compositionally technical for a moment here, both its intro and outro are performed in 6/8 time, while the vocal sections are in 4/4. The synthesizer solo section is in 7/4 before returning to 4/4 for the final chorus. Two measures of 5/8 follow the brief intro recap with a return to 6/8 and another synthesizer solo before the fadeout. In fact, bassist/vocalist Ricky Phillips cites “Fooling Yourself” as having always been his favorite composition by Styx: “People ask me, ‘What is it that gives Styx their sound?’ The way Tommy and JY play together has been a huge part of that sound, but it’s also the odd time signatures like you get in this song,” Ricky observes.
Toward the end of the recording sessions for The Grand Illusion, an Oberheim 4 Voice analog synthesizer arrived in the studio to further enhance the proceedings. “Its rich sounds unleashed another dimension of textures no one had yet taken advantage of,” points out Tommy Shaw. (Lawrence Gowan has since made sure to program that original vintage Oberheim sound into his current touring rig so that he can call it up for whatever song that needs it.)
Eagle-ear listeners will also note that vintage Oberheim sound quite deliberately lends a certain authentic weight to Styx’s 16th studio album, The Mission, which was released on June 16, 2017 on LP, CD, and as a digital download via Alpha Dog 2T/UMe (as well as in a 5.1 surround-sound mix on Blu-ray the following year). Tommy confirms the sound of The Grand Illusion — along with that of 1978’s Pieces of Eight and Side 2 of 1975’s Equinox — was instrumental in that key Mission production/performance gear decision.
And now, in a Styxworld exclusive, all seven bandmembers recount the impact The Grand Illusion has had over the years — and continues to have, day in and day out. The stage is set, the band is playing. . .
James “JY” Young (co-founding guitarist/vocalist): Dennis [DeYoung] is the one who gleaned the idea that it was our seventh record. I think the release date had originally been scheduled for 7/8/77 or something like that, and we went, “No, we want it on 7/7/77.” Just trying to stack the deck — not that we’re superstitious, or anything. (chuckles) So they changed the original release date to the 7th — which is fantastic! It has such a beautiful resonance and synergy.
Dennis wrote the lyrics, but as the man behind “Man of Miracles” [the title track to Styx’s November 1974 album], I had suggested “Come Sail Away” become not a song just about a sailing ship, but that it should morph into a song about a starship, which was my idea. “Come Sail Away” was also lifted by the release of Star Wars and Close Encounters of the Third Kind in the same year, so ’77 was the year for outer space.
[Your Styxologist notes: For additional context, the song “Man of Miracles” features lines like, “He was a man of miracles / Riding golden meteorites / Ruler of distant galaxies / Born of the Northern Lights.” Hence, you can see how that song’s lineage plays into the more “cosmic” portion of “Come Sail Away” that goes, “I thought that they were angels / But to my surprise / We climbed aboard their starship / And headed for the skies.”]
Young: We have the good fortune of The Grand Illusion continuing to be a resonant topic, and The Mission resonates with The Grand Illusion in a variety of ways. The theme of Tommy Shaw’s “Man in the Wilderness” intersects with “Radio Silence” — an individual against the forces of nature, wherever you happen to be. And there’s no greater wilderness than the absolute zero-temperature environment of outer space! (laughs)
Tommy Shaw (guitarist/vocalist): It’s 7/7 again — the date that changed everything! We made a record that sounds really good, and we worked really hard at trying to get it right. It wasn’t always romantic and sometimes we lost sleep over it, but what matters is how it turned out. It’s the creative process.
I run into people all the time who tell me that “Man in the Wilderness” and “Fooling Yourself” are the songs that helped them get through high school. I like hearing that. The times I’ve looked out in the crowd as we’re playing “Man in the Wilderness” to see people singing along who weren’t even born yet when it came out — that’s very satisfying.
Chuck Panozzo (co-founding bassist): The Grand Illusion was the right album at the right time. Why is it our best-selling album? It has the best songs. And it was a true collaboration.
Lawrence Gowan (keyboardist/vocalist): When we did The Grand Illusion / Pieces of Eight Tour in 2010, we discovered what a cohesive composition that album is from beginning to end. Delving into the parts and playing the songs in the actual running order reignited my enthusiasm for that album as an album. I was a fan of it then, and I’m a fan of it now.
I should also mention the album’s artwork has stood the test of time. It looks so engaging today. I love seeing that equestrian image mixed with the forest and the woman’s eyes whenever it gets projected onscreen behind us. It’s one of the great visual icons of rock history.
Ricky Phillips (bassist/vocalist): “Fooling Yourself” has always been my favorite composition by Styx. But being able to play “Castle Walls” live is awesome too, because I come from a heavier place. I appreciate that it’s a great track — and it’s bass-heavy on top of that. I miss playing “Castle Walls,” you know? I really loved how we did it when we did the whole record [as part of The Grand Illusion / Pieces of Eight Tour in 2010].
The first time I heard [the song] “The Grand Illusion” was when I was with The Babys, when we were touring with Styx [in February and March 1979]. It has that very clever, “Welcome back my friends / Here we are tonight” vibe — it’s grand and pomp, with that bolero beat. So very cool.
Todd Sucherman (drummer): The Grand Illusion will always have a soft spot in my heart because it’s the first full Styx record I ever heard or bought. My uncle Dennis happened to put that one on during one of our visits with him, shortly after that record came out.
My brother and I immediately went home and bought it, and we would play that record every day. It was the first record I ever bought from the band, and I continued to buy all their records in succession after that. To me, that album was the genesis of me liking the band, really.
Will Evankovich (guitarist/vocalist): With songs like “Fooling Yourself,” “Miss America,” and “Man in the Wilderness,” what’s not to love about The Grand Illusion? What’s more is, I now get to play these songs onstage with the band every night, delivered soulfully and true to form by the very guys who created them! I’m honored to be a part of this new chapter in the Styx lineage of amazing albums and performances, and The Grand Illusion at the at the top of the list.
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Text & photos by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Ozark images all courtesy Netflix
“To see Styx and ‘Renegade’ show up in the promos and in the trailer for the final episodes of Ozark like it did was a really amazing thing.” —Gabe Hilfer
Exactly how did “Renegade,” one of Styx's signature songs, make its way into the fabric of Ozark, the widely acclaimed Netflix drama series that's sure to garner a score of Emmy nods for its just-completed fourth and final season? Glad you asked.
To get the answers, I spoke exclusively with Gabe Hilfer, the music supervisor for Ozark who has also helmed the music supervision for other name shows like The Walking Dead, Mare of Easttown, and The Righteous Gemstones, to name but a few.
Let’s breakdown the impact of not only Styx in Ozark, but also of one of their Live & UnZoomed tourmates this summer, REO Speedwagon. In REO Speedwagon’s case, “Time for Me to Fly” played a key role in Season 3, Episode 3, which was titled “Kevin Cronin Was Here” — and indeed he was there, since REO themselves got to play that song live in the back half of the ep itself (in addition to having it appear in another key sequence in that very same episode).
In Styx’s case, “Renegade” factored into Ozark’s final season in two pivotal ways: 1) via a somewhat recast excerpt of the song in the trailer for Season 4’s final seven episodes that were made available for streaming back on April 29, and 2) the song itself plays an extended key role in a pair of scenes at the very outset of the second-to-last episode, S4 Ep13, “Mud.” As Styx guitarist/vocalist and “Renegade” songwriter Tommy Shaw told me, “Hearing ‘Renegade’ in the most anticipated season of Ozark was great news. And when I heard the way they had used the bits and pieces in the trailer, we were all blown away. We’ll be watching!” And watch we all did. Me, I’m currently rewatching the entire series because, well, taken as a whole, Ozark holds up even better on repeat viewing.
Recently, I got live and fully Zoomed with Hilfer to discuss how integral music is in general to the flavor of every Ozark episode, how the show’s lead actress Laura Linney interacted with the music she “heard” playing in her character Wendy Byrde’s car, and why “Renegade” was the hands-down perfect choice for inclusion in the series’ next-to-last episode. Oh mama, as the very beginning of our favorite song in question itself goes. . .
Mike Mettler: Gabe, you’ve been able to make some really great musical choices throughout the entire series of Ozark. From the very beginning, I feel like the sound design and the visuals have always matched up very, very well. Right off the bat, Radiohead was one of those first “perfect” choices from the very beginning [“Decks Dark,” which plays at the end of S1 Ep1, “Sugarwood,” that first streamed on Netflix on July 21, 2017]. Did you feel you had carte blanche to get anything you wanted from the start of the show?
Gabe Hilfer: (extends the beginning of his first word for maximum effect) Nnnnn. . . No! (MM laughs) Because with any first season of any show — no one’s seen it yet. So, you’re doing a lot of selling. You’re explaining what it is, what the tone is, and why people might want to be involved. Once it’s well-regarded or it’s out in the world, it’s a lot easier to sell the show to artists because then they’re like, “Oh damn, I love that show!”
Part of my job is I maintain relationships with artists, bands, publishers, labels, and stuff like that. When I come in and I tell them, “This is really good show — trust me. This is something you want to license me your music for,” they have to believe I’m credible. But I don’t always say that. Sometimes I tell them (whispers), “It’s ok.” (laughs heartily)
Mettler: (laughs) Yeah. Well, in this case, you could totally say how great Ozark was from the start, and the content of the show totally backs you up.
Hilfer: From the very beginning, like during the first season of the show, we were trying to find that different tone of what different characters’ music would be like. You’ve mentioned the Radiohead track. And then we had Ruth [Langmore, played by multiple Emmy Award-winner Julia Garner], where she’s wearing a Tupac shirt in one episode.
Chris Mundy, the showrunner, he used to write for Rolling Stone and other music publications — he knows his music. I came up in New York City in high school in the ’90s, so hip-hop was my music of choice, but that’s not always appropriate for every show. But when Chris sort of opened the door to using hip-hop, I was like, “Well . . . game on!” We had a great time trying to figure out the sound and the tone of what Ruth would like by going back to that established, golden era of hip-hop from the ’90s, which was a real sweet spot for her.
But like I said, hip-hop is not appropriate for every character in the show, so we’ve also used a lot of classic pop and rock music as well.
Mettler: Yes, you have used a lot of rock — and speaking of that, while we won’t give any actual spoilers here, you do have Styx’s “Renegade,” a song that’s in the commercials and promo teasers for the second half of the final season. It’s also a song that plays very prominently in the entire series’ penultimate episode, “Mud,” right from the start of it.
[Your Styxologist notes: Rock and Ruth do occasionally mix together on Ozark, as “Renegade” does indeed play during the opening moments of “Mud” while Ruth is supervising, shall we say, the “makeover” of the Langmore trailer compound.]
Mettler: Also during “Mud,” you have Laura Linney, who plays Wendy Byrde, driving in her car listening to “Renegade,” and then the DJ comes on to ID the song, and she interacts with what he’s saying. Did Laura have an earpiece in while she was doing all that so she could hear the song play? Is that how you lined it up so she could actually listen along to “Renegade,” and then have her “talk back” to the DJ?
Hilfer: Yeah, you’re right — that is how we do it. She had an earpiece, and she listened along to “Renegade” in that way so you don’t hear it in the room [i.e., where the Ozark crew was filming the scene], and then we added the song in later for the final cut. That’s how we get it all done.
Part of the job in post is figuring out how to get it to play in real time, and there’s often plenty of trial and error with the song choices. Like, “Let’s try this!” And then it’s, “Nope, that’s an awful idea.” And then you go, “Let’s try this!” And then it’s, “Nope — even worse idea.” And then you get the Goldilocks moment and you’re like, “Oh my God, the perfect song!”
But then part of it is the very-early-prescribed stuff that’s in the script, or you have a conversation super-early on with the writers and with Chris [Mundy] about how we’re going to shoot it, or what we’re going to do.
It was the same thing with the Gerry Rafferty track in the episode before the “Renegade” one, where they already knew it was “Right Down the Line.” In the episode they’re listening to it [S4, Ep 12, “Trouble the Water”], Wendy actually remarks something like — well, I can’t remember her exact line, but it was like, “I f---ing hate this song.”
Mettler: (laughs) And then she proceeds to hate on somebody, so to speak. Well, actually it was Marty [Byrde, her husband, played by Jason Bateman] who did that, I should say.
Hilfer: (laughs) Right! It’s more fun when you get to explain it when you have to go get the band or the artist to approve it with a line like that. And her line there — it’s honest, and it’s true. Her line about the song was more indicative of the fight she’s having with her husband at the time, because he’s grooving out and likes the song, and she’s not.
Mettler: Right. She’s not having it.
Hilfer: She’s not having it. And then he. . . [Your Styxologist intercedes to note: The plot-point spoiler of sorts here from Gabe about Marty’s ensuing actions has been officially redacted for those who haven’t seen the episode yet.]
Mettler: It’s such a great moment in the show too! Now, in the case of using “Renegade,” was that a writer’s room choice? Did they know they wanted to use that song for that particular sequence?
Hilfer: I think they did, yes.
Mettler: Cool. And as we already noted, Wendy also talks back to the DJ there. Was that a real DJ, or did you guys just have somebody on hand do that? Do you know who that was?
Hilfer: I gotta go back to check it, but I’m pretty sure it was someone in the crew. He wasn’t a professional DJ on a radio station, I don’t think.
[Your Styxologist clarifies: Listed as “himself” in the episode’s credits, DJ Townson Wells is clearly heard in Wendy’s car on a radio station nicknamed “The Hollow,” 107.2 FM. Townson Wells is actually an assistant director on Ozark, and COOL 102.7 FM, a.k.a. Lake of the Ozarks Radio – COOL 102.7 KQUL, can be heard on the dial and/or the Internet, “playing the greatest music ever made!”]
Mettler: I love that. Another thing I like about how you do that on Ozark is, many times when characters are in cars, it always feels realistic because we all almost have something playing in our own cars whenever we’re driving, just like Wendy has with “Renegade.” A song comes on like that and we react to it, sing along to it, or comment about it.
Now, I’m not going to assume Laura Linney knows those songs by Styx or REO Speedwagon, or any of that other stuff we hear in the show, from her actual life, but she did sing along to REO really convincingly. When she sings REO’s “Time for Me to Fly” in Season 3 [Ep 3, “Kevin Cronin Was Here”], it didn’t sound like she was “pretending” to do that. It was all very realistic. And I can also tell you, after that season went up on Netflix [or March 27, 2020], I personally heard from a lot of bands who were envious of REO getting to actually play on the show in real time like they did. Basically, every band was like, “Hey, we want to be doing that!”
Hilfer: Oh, I love hearing about all that! And it’s funny, because when I got those scripts, it was scripted that way. Early, early on, it was in there — like, “REO Speedwagon performs at the thing at the riverboat casino, and the [tour] manager shakes them [the Byrdes] down. If it’s money laundering, then we need this, and we need this!”
To me, our people were like, “What do you think the odds are of getting REO Speedwagon?” And I was like, “Honestly? Let’s try!” The thing about writers — and I’ll just say some controversial stuff right here — is writers can script in whatever they want, because that’s their job. They’re creatively and generally free. And then somebody kind of reins them in. Sometimes it’s me, and sometimes it’s not me, to be like, “You can’t afford that,” or “That’s not possible,” or whatever the case is. When someone scripted in “REO Speedwagon,” I was like, “Who knows? Let’s try.”
We reached out to them, and they were super-game for it. They were like, “How do we make it work? This feels like our perfect opportunity to be on camera. Let’s get it done!” They were pros, and they got it all done. That was actually the most seamless, real-band-on-camera situation I’ve ever been involved with — and I’ve been involved with many, many of them.
Mettler: I know you have, and I have to say that performance really looks and sounds great too. But if you actually step back from it for a second, you’re using the real guys there where, basically, REO Speedwagon is saying, “We’re going to launder money through our act.” Some people might say, “Hey, do you want to be associated with that?” But because it fits so perfectly into the world of Ozark, I don’t think anybody was overtly worrying about it. I’ve actually spoken to Kevin [Cronin] and other members of the band about it, and those guys couldn’t have been happier to have been involved with Ozark and that whole storyline.
Hilfer: Yeah, and their team and their publishing company were super-helpful — the guys at Mojo Music [& Media]. They called me after those episodes aired, and they were like, “Dude, the numbers of these REO Speedwagon streams and everything went through the roof!” — just like we’re seeing now with Kate Bush and the current season of Stranger Things [due to that uber-popular Netflix show featuring her great 1985 song, “Running Up That Hill”]. And, of course, we saw that with Styx and “Renegade” too.
Through thoughtful TV or film placement — everybody kind of rediscovers the music of these acts in that way. And you can see it in a scientific manner with some really, really big streaming numbers.
Mettler: So true! To finish up with “Renegade,” the lyrical foreshadowing there in the song itself — just like a lot of what happens with music on Ozark, you almost already know something dreadful might be coming before you see it, and “Renegade” is the perfect song for what’s in store for that episode.
Hilfer: It really is. And I will also say this. Not to butter my bread twice, but Netflix, more than any other studio I work with, their marketing team checks in with me like, “What music are you guys using in the show so we can figure out how we could use it?” They ask me for a list, so to see Styx and “Renegade” show up in the promos and in the trailer like it did was a really amazing thing.
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Celebrating all the fine prongs of Crash of the Crown, Styx’s truly transcendent 17th studio album that was released exactly one year ago today on June 18, 2021.
“We are not shy about accepting ideas on the songs we write, which makes them all co-writes. I’ve found this helps the songs and encourages ideas, and the songs tend to reflect the band mentality. Someone has the original vision, melody, chord progression, and basic lyrics, but having so much creative talent to lean on makes finishing these songs a real celebration.” —Tommy Shaw
By Mike Mettler, Resident Styxologist
Sound the Alarm! Styx’s utterly majestic 17th studio album, Crash of the Crown, was released exactly one year ago today on June 18, 2021 via Alpha Dog 2T/UMe on a variety of formats — namely, 180-gram high-grade clear and black vinyl, CD, and all major digital platforms. Wait a minute — can Crash of the Crown really be one year old already? Well, to slightly modify a song title from another classic Styx album — yes it can!
Not only that, but thanks to the interest and excitement surrounding the runaway success of Styx’s current Live & UnZoomed summer tour with good friends REO Speedwagon and Loverboy, Crash of the Crown recently ascended to No. 30 on Billboard’s Top Rock Albums chart. (It’s got legs, baby!)
“We did something extraordinary in creating Crash of the Crown. It came to us so naturally,” admits guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw before adding, “Absolutely no obstacles were going to get in the way of how we approached creating this album — and everything came out exactly the way we wanted to hear it.”
Let me reiterate the basic FAQs about Crash of the Crown (or COTC, for short) — some of which are also included in the album’s inner-sleeve liner notes, as written by yours truly, your resident Styxologist. Produced by Will Evankovich — the man behind the boards for the band’s previous studio masterpiece, June 2017’s The Mission, who became an official full-time member of Styx during the summer of 2021 — Crash of the Crown is a come-one, come-all clarion call that celebrates the creative mindmeld of seven musicians-slash-brothers in arms at the top of their collective game. The proof can be found throughout all 45 minutes of COTC, whether it’s the wistful observational musings of “Reveries” — an instantly catchy song featuring Styx’s patented, always-uplifting four- and sometimes five-part harmonious vocal blend on its choruses — the unmistakable snarl of “A Monster” that’s bolstered by a whirlwind outro solo from co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young, the breathe-easier singalong mantra that permeates “Sound the Alarm,” the dark yet redemptively hopeful cautionary tale that frames “Hold Back the Darkness,” or the elegiac communal grace of “To Those.” In essence, Crash of the Crown is a modern-day sonic chronograph of the endless regenerative cycle of the rise and fall — and rise again — of our shared human experience.
TO THOSE WHO FOUND BEAUTY IN THEIR COTC GROOVES
I asked two of COTC’s key content creators just a few short hours before they took to the stage at the Ameris Bank Ampitheatre in Alpharetta, Georgia on June 17, the night before this hallowed release anniversary, to tell me how the album and how it was received feels to them today, a full year later.
“As we tour this album with REO Speedwagon and Loverboy, it feels like we got a second shot at releasing it again,” observes Will Evankovich. “We are exposing a lot of new faces to these songs, and it’s exciting to see their reactions. I’m very proud of this album from start to finish. Without trying too hard, it naturally took on a different flavor than the previous album, The Mission. I’m proud of the effort we all put into this record. The level of creativity and stewardship in this band is a blessing, and testimony to how this album still speaks to longtime Styx fans.” (Hear hear, brother Will!)
For Tommy Shaw, COTC has turned up nothing but roses. “One year ago on this day, Crash of the Crown stopped being our own private gem that we created, and was released to the world!” he told me, with much gusto. “Most all the music was created before we knew what was coming. Once we knew we would not be touring or traveling due to the pandemic, we figured out how to get the recording done with new technology that sprang out of the need to keep creating. Soon, it was just another day of recording.”
That said, Tommy points out every Styx song is a family affair. “As you’ll notice on the COTC writing credits, we are not shy about accepting ideas on the songs we write, which makes them all co-writes,” he clarifies. “I’ve found this helps the songs and encourages ideas, and the songs tend to reflect the band mentality. Someone has the original vision, melody, chord progression, and basic lyrics, but having so much creative talent to lean on makes finishing these songs a real celebration.”
The band is, well, positively passionate about COTC making its presence known to Styx’s many, many fans across the globe. “Oh, is it out today?” Lawrence Gowan asked me on release day a year ago, somewhat rhetorically but fully in his typical, playful Gowanesque fashion. “OMG, I haven’t got a thing to wear!” Adds Tommy, with a wink, “After this, maybe we’ll have the guts to do that polka album we’ve all been talking about!” As you can tell by the degree of their levity, Styx are excited beyond words to celebrate everything that COTC is, and will be — and, naturally, that means the next logical step in doing just that is to go back on tour and road-test the album’s many aural wonders right where they belong: onstage. (More on that in just a bit.)
COTC: SONG BY SONG WITH TOMMY SHAW
Tommy took some extra time out of his typical pre-show preparations to analyze COTC song by song, so I’m going to turn the remainder of this particular section of the story over to his own exact words. “This is like finding out where our parents were when we were conceived,” Tommy notes with a laugh. Take it away, maestro. . .
Tommy Shaw: Will wrote “The Fight of Our Lives,” which was a great rallying opener. And the writing demo for “Monster” was born in my hotel room in Penticton on Lake Okanagan, British Columbia, during that break where we traveled through Glacier National Park and then stopped at the lake for a couple of days.
Will sent me a music track for what would become “Reveries.” I heard the melody and the first line of lyrics in my head, so I wrote more lyrics and recorded a version with his tracks. It’s one of those songs that, as a writer, tells you where to go next. I wish they were all like that!
“Hold Back the Darkness” came as a result of a good friend’s loss of a son to an accidental drug overdose. When there are no words in real life, a song can help express what you’re feeling.
“Save Us From Ourselves” — the title says it all!
The title track, “Crash of the Crown,” contains bits that were compiled over a few years of dressing-room jams in 5/4 that made it to soundchecks, and were then extended into a mini-suite.
“Our Wonderful Lives” was a latecomer, but it made it to the album just in time.
“Common Ground” took advantage of other dressing-room and soundcheck jams that had been evolving over the previous couple of years. When Lawrence wrote the section he sings, we knew it would be a great vocal opportunity — and he ran with it. One of my favorite LG vocals I’ve ever heard!
“Sound the Alarm” started in my hotel room at The Venetian in Las Vegas, when we were doing a residency there with Don Felder [in January 2018]. I made sure I recorded a little iPhone movie! This song was the result of me tuning a little Gibson acoustic guitar to an open-E chord. The title and the melody of the first verse flowed out of me like an old song I already knew, and I was recording it with my iPhone so I wouldn’t forget it. I wish they were all that easy! It was enough to get the song off the ground and finish it when we recorded it. It was pre-pandemic, even though it might sound like it was about that. It’s one I love performing every night.
“Long Live the King” was a Will Evankovich creation. Those beautiful Fender Electric 12-string arpeggios all through it make it a fun one to navigate as a player. I was happy to get to sing that one. It’s a tale as old as time that reminds me of Marie Antoinette’s response of “Let them eat cake” when confronted with the news that her subjects were starving. Very fun to sing that one.
“Lost at Sea” is one that Lawrence wrote about the siren’s song seduction of the sea that can drive one mad to the point of following that calling. At least that’s how I interpret it! It’s a beauty, and it opens the way to “Coming Out the Other Side,” another wonderfully sung verse by LG, and a tale about the joy of getting through a challenging situation and seeing it through — the joyful feeling of surviving and thriving.
That joy is obvious in “To Those,” a reminder to try and not be beaten down or made bitter by life’s challenges.
“Another Farewell” was composed and arranged by Will Evankovich, and it feels like the final melancholy moment before awakening into a dreamy new day, floating on a “Stream” under a clear, sunny blue sky.
. . . and with that, Tommy had to dash, in order to get ready for last night’s show in Alpharetta, Georgia — a trooper if ever there was one!
OUR WONDERFUL LIVE PERFORMANCES
And speaking of playing live, COTC has been, and continues to be, well-represented in Styx’s live sets. Right off the bat, the album’s opening track, the rousing “The Fight of Our Lives,” begins every night as the band’s new walk-on song, taking over that hallowed set-starter’s slot from The Mission’s “Overture.” Other COTC songs peppered throughout Styx sets over the past year include the Lawrence-led “Reveries,” the all-in multi-movement masterpiece “Crash of the Crown,” and the wholly prescient “Save Us From Ourselves,” as well as Tommy doing some of the truly uplifting “Sound the Alarm” acoustically before going into “Crystal Ball” — before he switched over to playing it in full more often than not (depending on the venue and how he feels in the moment).
After the first show of the summer 2021 tour that took place in St. Augustine, Florida, Tommy told me, “COTC songs went over big time. We’re taking on a lot of new things, but it’s a very exciting time to be working with Will onstage in the live mix. We’re moving the details forward at light-speed now.”
Tommy continues to sing Will’s praises, now that’s he a seasoned full-set performer with the band. (Prior to June 16, 2021, Will had played onstage with Styx in various segments of Mission-specific sets in 2019 and 2020.) “Over the last several years, Will has become a welcome and integral part of the band behind the scenes with co-writing and production of our new music,” Tommy notes. “This time around, we encouraged Will to take on the album mixing job for COTC as well. It was a natural next step to continue his role with us onto the stage. Will also took his first overnight trip in the band bus after the first show. We are now taking this to a new level out there, where the creativity levels we enjoy during writing and making records can continue uninterrupted.”
For his part, Will was quite gracious as he shared his thoughts with me directly following that June 16, 2021 show. “After many years of playing in Shaw Blades, and then seeing that relationship evolve into Tommy and I working through a terrific writing relationship, it manifested into the Styx universe,” Will clarifies, “and it is a massive universe of epic music. The entire band is made up of the finest musicians and creative artists you will find today. We have created a couple of really strong albums together, and I am now honored to have been asked to play this amazing collective of new and timeless music. I am looking forward to, to borrow one of our lyrics, ‘keep moving forward’ with this amazing group of musicians.”
Expect to see, and hear, Will onstage with the band for the entirety of every live Styx set moving forward — right where he belongs!
LONG LIVE THE EASTER EGGS
As both Tommy and Lawrence discussed on talkshoplive online on June 17, 2021, the eve of the album’s release, there are indeed a number of Easter eggs embedded all throughout the entire COTC package, much like there were for The Mission. This is again thanks to the teamwork between Tommy and the art direction and overall package design oh-so-expertly executed by Todd Gallopo, the visual visionary head of Meat and Potatoes, Inc. who also handled the same duties for The Same Stardust EP, The Mission, and iconic Styx catalog reissues under the UMe banner such as The Complete Wooden Nickel Recordings, Come Sail Away: The Styx Anthology, and Rockers, to name but a few.
In fact, your Styxologist was hanging out in Tommy’s backstage dressing room at the Saban Theater in Beverly Hills, California, on January 12, 2020, when Tommy first played a combination of early and mostly finished versions of most of the tracks that would appear on COTC for Gallopo to hear firsthand so he could begin visualizing the album-design concept you now have before you. Soon enough, Gallopo began formulating the crater-centric theme that would bless the main cover image — all of it done idea-by-idea in conjunction with Tommy. In fact, Gallopo can be given credit for convincing Tommy to remove the word “The” before the full COTC album title because Todd felt it would make the phrase read awkwardly and look too wordy on the cover — and his instincts were dead-on about that.
Not only that, but a cavalcade of Easter eggs — such as all the Morse code that appears on both the interior and the exterior of the overall package — was brainstormed by Shaw, Gallopo, and company. For my part of the proceedings, I too added a number of Easter eggs to the liner notes text itself, so have fun figuring out them all!
One final thing on this egg-centric topic: I won’t give it all away here, but I will confirm the various people you see scattered all over the cover in various poses and with different, shall we say, props are not members of the band or their vaunted crew. One of them, seen at the very top of the crater peering down inside with a trusty reporter’s notebook in hand, is indeed yours truly (an honor I will forever cherish, in fact). We’ll eventually dive deeper into identifying some of the other COTC Easter eggs in future stories, but for now: enjoy the hunt!
INSIDE THE CROWN OF CREATION
Let’s go inside the making of COTC, shall we? Some of the following has been adapted directly from the COTC liner notes I wrote between October 2020 and February 2021 — but, of course, you will have to buy a copy of the album to read all of them!
Styx’s holy mission to fulfill the laser-focused vision outlined by guitarist/vocalist and chief songwriter Tommy Shaw for Crash of the Crown was undeterred, regardless of some of the socially distanced hurdles imposed on the recording process due to this past year’s pandemic.
Some COTC songs had already been in the works during the days of The Mission (such as the aforementioned “Reveries”), while some were workshopped in hotel rooms all across the continent while the band was on tour (the way “A Monster” was born and bred during a scenic tour break in British Columbia), and others reached final fruition during the recording process itself (like the angelic vocal bridge that cements the relieved bliss of “Sound the Alarm”). The recording sessions for Crash of the Crown mainly took place in Shaw’s home studio in Nashville — albeit in strategic, quarantine-approved doses. “Because we connected so well as a band when we recorded The Mission, I just had to go there to make my contributions,” recounts bassist Ricky Phillips. “Tommy and Will are very clear about what they wanted for each song, and my job is to play the best parts I can to make every song better.” Adds original Styx bassist Chuck Panozzo — who provided his signature low-end tone for the inspirational “Our Wonderful Lives” and the acute aquatic fever dream “Lost at Sea” — “I traveled over 900 miles by car to record with Will and Tommy in person. They’re both so good at getting the best bass performances out of me in the studio. Making that trip to Nashville was the highlight of my year!”
Prior to the lockdown, keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan had laid down many vocal and instrumental tracks in Nashville in the fall of 2019, including some of the synthesized flourishes that reign over the unifying come-together entreaty of “Common Ground” that recall The Who at their Quadrophenia peak. “And then I also got to use some gear I never thought I’d have the chance to play on a Styx record, like Tommy’s Hammond B3 organ,” he confirms. Gowan later followed through with a number of additional keyboard elements (with his vintage Minimoog and Mellotron among them) and other lead and background vocal duties from his homebase in Toronto. Meanwhile, drummer Todd Sucherman was ensconced in Austin, having recorded all his world-class percussion in his home studio with the help of Audiomovers Listento plug-in technology without compromising the quality of his playing in the least. “You know how meticulous I am when it comes to recording my drum parts,” Sucherman affirms, “and using Audiomovers ensured I could do everything I wanted on each track with nothing left to chance.”
The title track — which world-premiered during Eddie Trunk’s “Trunk Nation” show on SiriusXM satellite radio’s Volume channel on May 6, 2021 — holds the unique distinction of featuring three lead vocalists, with JY lending his distinctive baritone to the opening verses, Tommy heading up the heroic stacked-vocal middle section, and Lawrence taking the lead for the final verse — another Styx first. “Perhaps the closest thing to it for me would be how Tommy and I traded lead vocals on ‘Snowblind,’” observes JY in reference to the foreboding, concert-favorite track from Styx’s chart-topping multiplatinum January 1981 release, Paradise Theatre. For his part, producer Evankovich — who co-wrote the bulk of COTC with Shaw in addition to singing and playing a multitude of instruments throughout the entire album — freely admits he was hoping to coax a David Bowie-circa-“Cat People (Putting Out Fire)” vocal vibe from Young, who was mostly happy to comply. “Will would sometimes ask me to do up to eight passes on various things, and I never like to do more than two or three,” Young recalls with a booming laugh. “But I respect Will as a producer and Tommy’s vision for the album, so we made it work. I gave them plenty of options.”
One of Shaw’s pivotal COTC contributions comes courtesy “Our Wonderful Lives,” a song he first previewed acoustically during the Big Love Benefit Concert that streamed online in January 2021 — and a track that serves as a stirring ode to taking stock of the finer points of life amidst trying times. It’s also the first-ever Styx song to feature a banjo, an instrument Shaw has occasionally played onstage as well as on some of his own solo recordings. “I never imagined playing banjo on a Styx record,” reveals Tommy, “but as we were cutting ‘Our Wonderful Lives,’ I thought maybe a touch of Americana might work — so I auditioned it, and it felt like it belonged.” Not only that, but another, er, wonderful “Lives” surprise comes by way of the jubilant piccolo trumpet solo from guest performer Steve Patrick, which exhibits quite the deliberate Beatlesque flair.
After spending the pandemic year on the touring sidelines, Styx are beyond eager to play as much of Crash of the Crown live as they can. “I can’t wait to feel that group energy whenever we get back on the same stage together,” Shaw admits. “We did something extraordinary in creating COTC. It came to us so naturally, and we can’t wait to bring these songs to life the way they’re meant to be played.”
As Styx continues to do full justice to COTC music out on the planks, we can visit and/or revisit all 15 of its majestic studio tracks to continue taking us to new and renewed aural heights. Beyond the shadow of a royal doubt, I hereby decree Crash of the Crown to be a timeless album for the ages. Long live the king!
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Celebrating Styx’s most cosmically vibrant studio album, The Mission, which was released five years ago today on June 16, 2017.
by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
band photos by Jason Powell
“The planets truly aligned for The Mission, and I couldn’t be prouder. It’s our boldest, most emblematic album since Pieces of Eight.” —Tommy Shaw
Happy fifth birthday to The Mission! The facts about it are as follows: Styx’s 16th studio album, The Mission, was released exactly five years ago today on June 16, 2017 via Alpha Dog 2T/UMe on CD, 180-gram vinyl, and download via various digital services, and it’s since taken its rightful place in the pantheon of unquestionably great great great Styx albums of all time.
In a comment made exclusively to Styxworld to mark this most majestic occasion, vocalist/guitarist/co-pilot Tommy Shaw observed, “We’re so proud of The Mission. Everyone shines on this album, and with the 5.1 surround version that was released in 2018, there’s another opportunity for fans to take the trip all over again in the 5.1 environment. And I hope our fans find all the subtle things hidden in the album/CD/Blu-ray graphics too. Here’s a hint: Check the Martian landscape!” (And here’s hoping we get a full-bore Dolby Atmos surround mix of The Mission in the not-too-distant future as well!)
Over the course of the first five years of the album’s public life, Tommy has noted specifically on many an occasion in interviews, on social media, and from the live stage that the Styx family wants everyone to hear The Mission from start to finish by following their strongly suggested “no shuffling!” policy. In fact, you’ve probably heard Tommy say something to the effect of “Take the whole trip uninterrupted!” before he introduced one of The Mission’s key tracks, “Radio Silence,” in many of Styx’s pre-pandemic live sets over the past few years.
As noted in this space some 60 months ago in my official capacity as the chief information officer of the Global Space Exploration Program (or GSEP for short), I wrote that the “sonically sweet” The Mission is Styx’s “most ambitious, most challenging, and most rewarding release to date” — and that’s not just hype, either. The album has that rarefied timeless quality to it that makes it feel as if you’ve known it forever, yet still feels like it’s brand-spanking new. I was able to experience Mission songs in various stages of progress — and always on headphones, to keep the sonics hush-hush from anyone else in the vicinity — as they were being created behind closed doors over their 2-plus-year gestation period, with the ensuing end result being a career-defining work, to say the least.
To that end, The Mission is an aurally adventurous 43-minute thrill ride that chronicles the trials, tribulations, and ultimate triumphs of the first manned mission to Mars in the year 2033 onboard a spacecraft with the more-than-likely familiar name of Khedive. From the hopeful drive of “Gone Gone Gone” to the stargazing machinations of “Locomotive” to the rough-riding blaze of glory that permeates the hard-charging “Red Storm” (a benchmark track in 5.1, btw!) to the elegiac optimism of the closing track “Mission to Mars,” The Mission succeeds in delivering the greater good from a band that continues to fire on all cylinders, now 50 years after signing their first recording contract back in 1972. (And you can quote me on that — all of it.)
Here are some more cool techie facts about the making of The Mission: The album was recorded at Blackbird Studios, The Shop, and 6 Studio Amontillado in Nashville. The storyline was written by Tommy Shaw and Will Evankovich. Will is also the album’s producer — and, as of the summer of 2021, is officially a fulltime member of the band. Jim Scott (Foo Fighters, Tom Petty, Tedeschi Trucks Band) did the mixing at his own Plyrz Studio in Valencia, California, and Richard Dodd (Jason Aldean, Melissa Etheridge) handled the mastering in Nashville. Engineering was handled by Will, Alan Hertz, and Sean Badum. Additional engineering was done by JR Taylor, the assistant mixing engineer was Kevin Dean, and additional editing was done by Derek Sharp.
The liner notes were written by yours truly, Mike Mettler, and the in-studio photography was done by, of course, our main man Jason Powell. Finally, the amazing album artwork and overall design was done by Todd Gallopo of meat and potatoes, inc. — much of it being completed before he even heard one note of the album’s music, which goes to show just how in tune he was with the overall Mission concept.
There is, of course, a much different story for how Todd put together the intricate artwork for Styx's most excellent 17th studio album, June 2021’s Crash of the Crown — and we will discuss the first anniversary of that truly stellar release in just a few short days from now. In the meantime, here are some insightful comments about the project at hand from the men who made The Mission to tide us over in our collectively earthbound meantime. Light it up, let’s get this show on the road. . .
Tommy Shaw (acoustic and electric guitars, mandolin, and vocals): The planets truly aligned for The Mission, and I couldn’t be prouder. It’s our boldest, most emblematic album since Pieces of Eight.
James “JY” Young (electric guitar and vocals; the co-founding guitarist/vocalist sings lead on “Trouble at the Big Show”): In the 40th anniversary year of our release of our biggest-selling album of all time [July 1977’s] The Grand Illusion, it just seemed truly appropriate to save our new studio album until that year. Needless to say, I’m very excited about it.
Lawrence Gowan (piano, B3 organ, synthesizers, and, vocals; the keyboard maestro sings lead on “Gone Gone Gone,” “The Outpost,” et al): The album feels simultaneously comfortable and new. It’s both entertaining and charming, and a natural progression of our sound.
Will Evankovich (producer and storyline co-author): The Mission is one of those once-in-a-lifetime opportunities to be a part of something unique and special that’s happening in real time right in front of you. It is one of those albums that musically and cosmically showed you the next right thing to do every step of the way. I will forever be grateful and proud of what we did in this body of art.
Chuck Panozzo (bass guitar; the co-founding bassist lends his signature low-end sound to “Hundred Million Miles From Home”): The Mission is a sincere and honest representation of how Styx built upon where we were in the 20th century in order to go somewhere new in the 21st century.
Todd Sucherman (drums, percussion, and Waterphone): There’s a lot of great ear candy on this album. It’s what you get when great ideas come together and everyone works on them as a team.
Ricky Phillips (bass guitar): The Mission was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I’m proud to be a part of it.
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Join us in this celebration of Styx’s magically inspired covers album, which was released on May 10, 2005.
Big Bang Theory, Styx’s rousing run through a baker’s dozen of celebrated rock and blues classics — in addition to a stripped-down makeover of one of their own benchmark hits — was released 17 years ago on the New Door/UMe label on May 10, 2005. “I felt we needed to re-imagine the band as much as we could, and move more toward where my heart was and where Tommy [Shaw]’s heart was,” explains Styx co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young. Adds guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw, “Being unpredictable is a great thing. Doing Big Bang Theory fit into being adaptable and flexible enough to go off the menu for what’s expected of us and do things we’re not really sure how they’re going to turn out until we work through them. It’s kind of who we are.”
On Big Bang Theory, which debuted at No. 46 on the Billboard Top 200 albums chart, Styx encapsulated the range of their depth and eclectic taste, from Tommy’s heartfelt take on Blind Faith’s “Can’t Find My Way Home” (a personal favorite of Chicago-based vocal powerhouse Ava Cherry, onetime backup singer for both David Bowie and Luther Vandross) to JY’s impassioned update of Willie Dixon’s “It Don’t Make Sense (You Can’t Make Peace)” to keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan’s threading the nautical needle with Procol Harum’s “A Salty Dog.” Or, as newest Styx bandmember guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich quite succinctly puts it, “What band doesn’t love putting a list of their favorite songs together, and then covering them on an album? Big Bang Theory is a fine collection of high-level songwriting executed and performed in a high-level way by Styx!” (Hear, hear!)
The one track that fueled the whole Big Bang shebang was actually the key ingredient of Styx’s now legendary set at Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Festival in Dallas on June 5, 2004 — an inspirational cover of “I Am the Walrus,” John Lennon’s surreal slice of psychedelic wordplay pie that was originally released in November 1967, in turn serving as a shining moment in The Beatles’ Magical Mystery Tour film and on the ensuing double-EP and full album. A classic Gowan tour de force, Styx’s version of “Walrus” became an instant hit on classic-rock radio, reaching all the way up to No. 2. (It’s also a song that occasionally makes an appearance in the band’s live rotation whenever Styx plays longer sets — and was a special bonus addition to one of the band’s earliest Styx Fix Saturday night broadcasts on YouTube in the spring of 2020.)
In a Styxworld exclusive, the entire band tells us the tale of how Big Bang Theory came to be and assesses the album’s continuing legacy — plus, a few other special guests chime in about it as well. Goo goo goo joob. . .
James “JY” Young (co-founding guitarist/vocalist): After we got the [2004] Crossroads gig, I said, “What can Lawrence do? We can’t really do blues.” Then I said, “Well, [Eric] Clapton hung out with The Beatles, and Lawrence has been noodling on ‘Walrus’ since way back when.” It was probably back in 1999 when I first heard him singing it during a soundcheck. It jumped into my brain as we were driving to a gig where we were going to rehearse, so I said to him, “You know ‘Walrus.’ Why don’t we work up a Styx version of that song?” And we did an incredible version — Lawrence sounds just like John Lennon on it.
Lawrence Gowan (keyboardist/vocalist): I used to play “I Am the Walrus” in Rhinegold, my band in the ’70s. We all kind of knew it in our heads, you know? I knew it because I worked out the chords to the record, and I knew some of the King Lear scat at the end — “Sit you down father, rest you.” I walked everyone through the chords, and everyone applied their own imagination to it, from their memories. There are no heavy guitars on the original at all. Tommy and JY basically played the orchestra part of the song with two guitars, and they put in all the horns and orchestral bits. I also tossed those harmonies in on the keyboards, and there are some strings behind the piano that I’m playing. Todd [Sucherman] was quite faithful to the Ringo [Starr] approach to that song, especially the fills. People hear that and go, “Oh! There’s a live version I never heard!” And then they realize it was done by somebody else — us.
Tommy Shaw (guitarist/vocalist): Lawrence had been playing around with “Walrus” at soundchecks. He knew the arrangement, and not everybody knows that song. None of us really knew it as something we would jam on. Suddenly, we were like, “Ok, show me where this is going to go.” Little by little we learned those progressions, and then we decided to record it live up in Lincoln City, Oregon on my birthday [September 11, 2004]. We actually recorded it on JY’s laptop, on Pro Tools. That was the easiest way of getting it done — and it was a really good recording, too. For us, it was such a treat.
Ricky Phillips (bassist/background vocalist): I was only in the band for a year or two when we did that. I’ve been stopped by a lot of musicians who comment on how great they think our “Walrus” is. One of the reasons it was successful was because we never discussed it. I don’t think anybody referenced the original recording. I don’t even know how many years it had been since I’d even heard the original, but it stuck in my brain when we started playing it.
Todd Sucherman (drummer): Honestly, I think we play that song so well, and it’s a song that almost no one covers — and not to the level that we do. We have fun with it, and clearly the audience has fun with it as well. I always love when the song is in the set. It’s not always in the set, but it creeps in from time to time. It’s The Beatles, what can you say? I like when Lawrence makes mention onstage that we did this on a record, live, so a layperson won’t go, “Oh they’re just jamming on a Beatles song.” There’s a reason we did that — and it got to No. 2 behind the almighty U2, who were at No. 1 back in May 2005 — being that no “new” radio stations would play any new music from us, and the classic rock stations wouldn’t play new music from us either, so that was like a little loophole into getting on radio. It’s a good lesson for any musician: Don’t roll your eyes at any notion. If you approach it with open heart, open mind, and open ears, you can certainly surprise yourself, and come out the better for it.
Lawrence: We never even discussed doing a studio version. The excitement of it, from the first time we did it, seemed to be what its value was — the live audience hearing, “I Am the Walrus,” and how they react to it. Everything else for the album came from that.
JY: The genesis of doing the whole album thing was me driving by 2120 South Michigan Avenue in Chicago, the old Chess Studios where artists like Howlin’ Wolf, Muddy Waters, Bo Diddley, Chuck Berry, Willie Dixon, and Buddy Guy recorded. A lot of great records were made there. The Yardbirds and The [Rolling] Stones went there to record too.
What happened was, I was driving in downtown Chicago, and I found a parking meter on South Michigan Avenue. I was waiting around, just listening to the radio and making phone calls, and I noticed 2120 was now Willie Dixon’s Blues Heaven Foundation. I said to myself, “Styx needs to go in there and record.” I went inside and talked with the people in there about it, and ultimately we arranged [with Marie Dixon and Kevin Mabry] to record there.
Tommy: Of course, there was no longer any recording equipment at 2120 since it had become a blues museum, but with Pro Tools and things, we just pulled up a truck and turned it into a recording studio. And Mrs. Marie Dixon was awesome. The whole family embraced us being there.
And then [legendary Chuck Berry pianist] Johnnie Johnson came into it. He couldn’t have been sweeter. We were just going to do whatever anybody wanted to do and whatever Johnnie felt comfortable with. But then [blues vocal legend] Koko Taylor shows up! She wanted to be a part of it. We all just sat around the board we set up downstairs, very casual, playing “Blue Collar Man.” She was there with a microphone, and just threw it down. There were a lot of lumps in the throats and teary eyes, because it was just (pauses). . . it was just magical. I’m glad we recorded it. Otherwise, it would have been one of those crazy, wonderful musical moments that’s only in your memory.
[Your Styxologist notes: That special version of BCM is officially titled “Blue Collar Man @ 2120,” and it appears as the final cut on the BBT CD. Sadly, Johnnie Johnson died at age 80 in St. Louis on April 13, 2005, and Koko Taylor died at age 80 in Chicago on June 3, 2009.]
It was just one of those things that was so well timed. It all started with an idea — with James Young thinking, “What if I pull in there?” That’s what I love about it; everything starts with a thought. If you act on it to see where it leads you, something amazing can happen.
Ricky: My favorite recording of the set is Koko Taylor singing “Blue Collar Man” and not changing the lyric, keeping it the male gender: “I’m a blue collar man.” Somehow, it was so right. And boy, did she believe that song; you could tell by the way she sang it. You can tell it shouldn’t have been changed.
Tommy: Recording “One Way Out” in itself [as a nod to the live version done by The Allman Brothers Band on their legendary February 1972 double album, Eat a Peach] was a great experience, especially for this band, to interpret that song. It was also a great opportunity for Todd Sucherman to play some serious drums!
And who in their right mind would have thought, years later, I’d be playing Duane Allman’s 1957 Les Paul onstage, in Macon, Georgia on that song [at City Auditorium on October 5, 2014]? Fate has a wonderful way of tying up little knots and making things happen that you’d never even really consider.
JY: Willie Dixon’s son Butch was a 6-foot-5, 300-pound guy who was very interested in the music business. I loved him. He said, “You guys really have to do a Willie Dixon song on your next record.” So I said, “Yep, we’re going to do ‘Don’t Make Sense (You Can’t Make Peace).’” Willie had given me his [1983-released Mighty Earthquake and Hurricane] album when I had met him in the ’80s, and nobody had ever covered that song. I just thought it was perfect for the times that we were in — 2004, and post-September 11.
Lawrence: I think the song that was the biggest surprise and the one that took the band a little while to embrace was “Talkin’ About the Good Times,” by The Pretty Things [included as a bonus track on their December 1968 opus, S.F. Sorrow]. I really like what we did with it. It was a different kind of pressure — as in, “Don’t let the song down” rather than, “Oh, I hope they’ll like this song.” We made a more polished version of it, and I just really like the fact we did it. That’s one where, whenever I hear it in the rotation of the songs that play during the preshow before we come onstage, I think in my head, “God, that sounds so bloody good.” (chuckles)
Tommy: “I Can See for Miles” [from The Who’s seminal December 1967 album, The Who Sell Out] was a treat, because I’d never been in a band that played Who songs. And that was right up JY’s alley too. Over the years, Styx would mess around on Who songs at soundchecks, and I think we played one or two of them live, many brain cells ago. But when it came to “I Can See for Miles,” I leaned on everybody to help me keep it authentic. It was more in my wheelhouse than I realized.
Ricky: “I Can See for Miles” and Manic Depression” are ones I’ve always wanted to play, and always admired. Doing “Manic Depression” [from The Jimi Hendrix Experience’s legendary May 1967 debut, Are You Experienced] was a blast for me, because I was a Hendrix freak as a kid. Still am! But after you play them, it feels like the “We’re not worthy!” thing.
Todd: “Manic Depression” was a fantastic thing to do. It’s such a showpiece for drum ideas. It would be easy to go overboard and over the top, but the trick was to play just enough, and the right amount. I used that song and “One Way Out” in my second Methods & Mechanics DVD [released in 2011], and I will sometimes perform either of those tracks at my drum clinics.
Tommy: We were in Europe when we shot the video for “Can’t Find My Way Home” [from Blind Faith’s self-titled August 1969 album]. When you have a location like that — oh, man! A lot of it was done in Nottingham, some of it was in Berlin, and I can’t remember if we used anything from Amsterdam. We also did it on the ferry at Dover. And that’s such a great red rain jacket I’ve got on there. (smiles)
JY had one of those small digital movie cameras. We were down by the Thames one afternoon, just walking around. I had the song on my iPod, and that was our playback. We saw those ladies sitting there at the bus stop and we asked, “Do you mind?” I don’t know if they ever really understood what we were doing. (chuckles)
Lawrence: I think JY may have started singing “I Don’t Need No Doctor,” or maybe he just suggested it; I could be wrong. I loved that Humble Pie album [November 1971’s live benchmark, Performance: Rockin’ the Fillmore]. That may be the one song where we did go and listen to the original live version. It’s a vocal style I never really get a chance to use in Styx, though I guess I do a little bit of that now in “Rockin’ the Paradise.” As an encore piece, it has a little more grit, and “I Don’t Need No Doctor” gave us license to do that. “Doctor” made it into the set for about a year as an encore, right before “Renegade.” We got a great crowd reaction for that one, because people were not expecting it at all.
Peter Frampton (then-lead guitarist in Humble Pie who played on the original “I Don’t Need No Doctor”): Yes, Styx did a great version of “Doctor.” It was a real thrill to hear them do that song. I love those guys.
Tommy: “A Salty Dog” was always a favorite of mine, by Procol Harum. I loved that record [released in June 1969]. It was just one of those haunting tunes. I love the flatted fifth in that song, and how orchestral it is. It’s right up our alley. That’s a song that would have been a great Styx song, right off the bat.
Lawrence: I love Procol Harum. To my mind, they were the first progressive band after The Beatles — who did every style of rock there is — but Procol Harum was the first band that picked up the progressive aspect of it. When I got A Salty Dog, I loved the title song. But I could not figure out those chords and the structure of that song — those were really unusual chords. I’d go, “What the hell is that?” I also like that “A Salty Dog” kind of ties to “Come Sail Away,” you know? I envisioned that. We did a nice job on that one.
Gary Brooker (Procol Harum keyboardist/vocalist at the center of the above pic, who co-wrote and sang “A Salty Dog” in 1969; sadly, he recently passed away on February 19, 2022): Styx covered that one, did they? Wonderful. Well, that’s very nice of you to share that. Whenever we sing or play “A Salty Dog” ourselves, we feel it’s really become our audience’s own song, this one — and that makes it refreshing to play, every time we play it.
Will Evankovich (guitarist/vocalist who joined Styx fulltime in the summer of 2021): What band doesn’t love putting a list of their favorite songs together, and then covering them on an album? In this case, there are some great choices. Particular favorites include “I Am the Walrus,” [Jethro Tull’s] “Locomotive Breath,” and “Can’t Find My Way Home.” These are the deep-cut favorites not to miss. Big Bang Theory is a fine collection of high-level songwriting executed and performed in a high-level way by Styx! I also hope, in the not-so-distant future, we can add one of these gems into our current live set.
Ricky: What’s the overall legacy of Big Bang Theory? For one thing, it’s interesting that it’s being talked about now. I didn’t know people even noticed it. “I Am the Walrus” lived on the charts for quite a while, and it lived on a lot of stations around the country. Beyond that one, the album is a very odd collection of songs. But at the same time, that’s why it’s interesting to listen to.
Todd: The moral of the Big Bang Theory story is, if you keep an open mind and an open heart and open ears, you might learn to love something that before, you paid no mind to at all.
Lawrence: The songs were well chosen, I think. It was just beginning to get popular about 15-20 years ago for bands to cover other bands’ stuff, and now it’s done fairly regularly. We never thought of doing the rest of the album live, like we did with “Walrus.” That’s something fairly unusual about the record. It opens up with a live track, and then you get a studio album!
I love the song choices on Big Bang Theory. In many ways, it kind of distilled a lot of the spirit of what the band is now. There’s a lot of fun on there. With it, I think we made people look into areas they might not have otherwise. It was a bit of a challenge to the audience. It’s also like the live show is now, which is the center of the band’s existence. It’s fun but it still surprises people, the way we surprised people with what we chose to put on that Big Bang Theory record.
JY: The genesis was we had the No. 2 classic rock song across the country with “Walrus,” and with the help of some independent promo guys, we became our own record company, and put it out there. We didn’t sell anything, but it was just a cool thing to have there on classic rock radio. The key is classic rock radio believes that when their listeners hear something that’s not familiar, they turn it off. But “Walrus” is a familiar song by a well-known band to them, so they won’t change the channel. Then we just decided to go back and do an album of songs that influenced Styx — songs that influenced all of us.
Tommy: It fits into us being adaptable and flexible, and to be able to go off the menu for what’s expected of us. We had the opportunities to do these songs, and we weren’t sure how they were going to turn out. But there was nobody saying “No.” We said, “Yes, let’s do it! Let’s figure it out when we get there. We’ll do the best we can.” That’s why a lot of that stuff is so real. Doing covers — some of them you know, some of them you’re learning, and some of them you’re coming up with on the spot. It’s kind of who we are.
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Styx drummer Todd Sucherman shares his fondest memories of his longtime drum tech Paul Carrizzo, who passed away last week at age 68.
By Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Photos courtesy Todd Sucherman and Styx
Styx drummer Todd Sucherman’s longtime drum tech of 20 years, Paul Carrizzo, passed away peacefully at the way-too-young age of 68 on March 16, 2022. (You can read our original News section post about Paul’s passing right here.) Not only did Styx honor Paulie’s memory onstage after their triumphant Mission show at the Beacon Theatre in New York City on that quite emotionally draining night of March 16 (as well as both during and after their ensuing performances in the days that have followed), but each bandmember and crewmember have since paid tribute to Paulie in their own individual ways.
On Saturday, March 19, Todd himself shared some deeply personal thoughts and loving memories about the time he spent with Paulie, his brother in arms over those two full decades. Today, with Todd’s direct permission, we here at Styxworld are sharing his feelings about Paulie verbatim from that post.
(Incidentally, if you’d like to read more about Paulie and his amazing life in his own words, all Styx Lounge members can now access a deep-dive interview I had the honor of conducting with him that’s now posted over in the Lounge area of our site, under the Styxology banner.)
And now, Todd has the floor, sharing stories only he can tell us about his forever favorite drum tech and ours, Paul “Paulie” Carrizzo.
Todd Sucherman: I wish to wholeheartedly thank everyone who expressed their condolences on the loss of our Styx family member, Paul Carrizzo. All the kind notes, remembrances, calls, texts, emails, and expressions of sympathy are deeply appreciated by all of us in the Styx Family, as well as those in the extended the Carrizzo family.
Paulie loved and adored his wife, Maxine, since they first met. They spoke multiple times a day when he was on the road. They were a perfect pair. Paulie simply made everyone feel special, just with a “hello” or a wave or a smile.
It has been comforting to read so many messages about how Paulie made those he came into contact with feel he was truly a kind soul. Maxine told me that he knew everyone’s name at their grocery store — every single person. He’d ask someone’s name if they were new, and introduce himself. “Hey, these folks take care of us, we should know them.” That’s the kind of guy he was. So many messages were left from local stagehands, local crewmembers, and various people who may have had one simple interaction with him, no matter how small or brief, who remembered his kindness. He made an impression, and you did not forget him.
I first met Paulie on the Styx/Bad Company/Billy Squier tour in 2001. He was working with Nir Z, who was playing drums with Billy Squier. We became fast friends, and it didn’t take long to see how well he was doing his gig. He was teaching everyone around him tricks of the trade, and helping others endlessly. When my tech decided to pursue other interests later that year, I called our then-production manager, Keith Marks, and asked him to call Paulie to see if he would like to come onboard with us. I was thrilled when he accepted the position.
Our first gig together was February 11th, 2002. When I came in that day, not only was the kit perfectly built and tuned, but he had fixed three issues I had with the kit in ways I never would have thought of — I was knocked out from day one, and that feeling never stopped.
I just had a text conversation with drummer Ron Wikso, and he had Paulie as a tech when he was playing with Foreigner in the ’90s. He told me, “Paulie was the only tech I’ve had in my entire career where I never had to check the drums before a show. Everything was always perfect, spotless, and sounding amazing, with 100% consistency.” I replied, “I had that for twenty years.”
It’s true. I never had to check anything, ever. He never had to come onstage to fix anything drum-related during a show. (Microphones are the audio dept.) Other than blowing out the bottom snare head or blowing out the snare wires during a show (or blowing confetti off the drums with a leaf blower in “Renegade”), he never had to come out for something that had to do with the drums. Everything was perfect — always. 100% perfection every night, without fail. Truly astounding. Paulie Carrizzo batted 1000.
I always referred to our setup as “our drums” because he was the custodian of, well, a very expensive custom drum kit. He looked after four main custom Pearl Masterworks kits in his twenty years (B-rig kits not included in that equation). They all remain in exquisite shape.
Outside of his talents with drums, he was also a skilled guitar tech, a true master chef, a general culinary connoisseur, a walking encyclopedia of music from the ’60s and ’70s, and a true friend that always had your back. An Italian Bronx boy with a heart of gold. His love of friends and family can’t even be described. He was a big softie, a sweetheart, yet he did not suffer fools gladly. He did have a gruff side, but you always knew where his heart was. We never got into an argument in twenty years. Disagreements, perhaps — but we never had a moment where we were locking horns and hollering at each other. He knew I loved him and I know that he loved me, and we said it to each other freely and often.
Just ten years ago, we celebrated our “tenth anniversary” by finding an old school Italian restaurant on the road on a day off, and then we enjoyed a bottle of Cristal Champagne as a nightcap.
Right after our twentieth anniversary, he died. I can’t get my head around it yet.
This will take a while to process, and a while to heal. He was a central figure in my life for so long. As our mutual friend, Ronn Dunnett, said in his tribute to Paulie, “Drum techs are a very special breed, and their job descriptions extend far beyond setup and tear down. Brother, friend, fan, confidant, confessor, guidance counsellor, bodyguard, wing man, physician, chauffeur, comedian, secretary, nurse. . . . to artists like Todd Sucherman and Styx — and everyone he ever worked with — Paulie was all of these.” These words are so true, and Paulie had a long and illustrious career before we ever met. Oh, the stories.
My heart hurts for Maxine. They should be spending their golden years together on a beach, enjoying each other’s company into the sunset. My heart hurts for his whole extended family and old friends that knew him much longer than I did. My heart hurts for the friends that were just beginning to know him and didn’t get to spend enough time with him. My heart hurts for our dear Styx crew, who are, without a doubt, a true family.
Ultimately, we must move on feeling grateful and thankful that we had this special person in our lives for so long. He has enriched my life professionally and personally in profound ways I could never measure or describe in words.
Forgive me for not labeling each photo you see here with a location, date, who the other people are in the photo, or the photographer’s names. It’s just a “Paulie-Palooza” of photos as a tribute, and hopefully they will make you smile whether you knew him or not. Maybe you can see what a special soul he was just by looking at him smiling back at you, or seeing the pride he took in his work.
My partner on the road, my beautiful dear friend, I will love and miss you forever. Thank you.
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By Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Photos courtesy of Styx
Paul “Paulie” Carrizzo, Todd Sucherman’s longtime drum tech, peacefully passed away earlier today on March 16, 2022, at age 68. He would have celebrated his 69th birthday on May 20.
Paulie spent 20 full years working with Todd and Styx day in and day out, and was one of the most loyal, most knowledgeable, friendliest, and longest-serving drum techs in the music business.
Back on February 11, in honor of the 20th anniversary of all his time spent working with the band, Todd said of Paulie, “Paulie Carrizzo came into the Styx camp on February 11, 2002. For 20 years, I have been one of the luckiest drummers who ever lived to have someone like him watching over me, and our drums. Thank you, dear friend!”
The Styx Crew share the following thoughts: “We the Styx Crew are devastated by the news of the passing of our beloved brother Paulie. Our loss is only surpassed by that of his wife Maxine and their family. Thank you for your support at this time.”
Styx humbly requests everyone’s understanding and respect for privacy at this time.
We will post a longer, more detailed story about Paulie’s amazing life and career here on Styxworld in the days and weeks to come.
RIP, our forever brother of the road.
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Three key reasons why February 22 is one of the most important dates in Styx history: 1) The band sign their first recording contract 50 years ago on this day in 1972; 2) Kilroy Was Here Turns 39; and 3) Damn Yankees Turns 32. Happy golden anniversary to Styx, y’all!
Text by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Current band photos by Jason Powell
“To me, there is an arc to every artist’s career. First, you become known initially as a performer. And then you begin to establish yourself with new songs and new music. You may do a cover song here or there, but mostly you go with new material written by you or by others. That goes on for a while — and then you get signed.” — James “JY” Young
Hello friends! Today, we celebrate one of the most important dates in Styx history — namely, February 22. Three major milestones in the Styx universe all occurred on this most hallowed of dates, the very first and most important of which happened exactly 50 years ago to the day — so let’s tackle each of them chronologically, shall we?
IF I HAD A WOODEN NICKEL
First, and most important in the 2.22 trifecta, Styx signed their first official recording contract with the Chicago-based independent label Wooden Nickel Records 50 years ago today on February 22, 1972. The five co-founding members of Styx at the time of that most notable hometown Wooden Nickel label signing can all be seen in the above vintage of-era photo, from left to right: bassist Chuck Panozzo, drummer John Panozzo, guitarist/vocalist John “J.C.” Curulewski, keyboardist/vocalist Dennis DeYoung, and guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young. And, as JY himself confirms, “Within 14 months of my joining the band, we had our first recording contract.”
From there, Styx proceeded to create their first four studio albums for Wooden Nickel — Styx (1972), Styx II (1973), The Serpent Is Rising (1973), and Man of Miracles (1974) — before joining the well-respected A&M Records roster with December 1975’s Equinox. JY and I actually began talking about the band’s 50th anniversary at least five years ago, in fact, and perhaps it was three or so summers ago when he gave me the following quite prescient prediction: “I keep coming back to the idea that early 2022 is the 50th anniversary of us signing our first recording agreement, so I imagine we’ll do something special for that when the time comes,” he theorized in the most perfect, JY-like way possible.
Well, the time is now, the day is today, and the band’s Tour schedule proves it. Not only will Styx be honoring this truly special golden historical date themselves by performing in Tallahassee, Florida, later in the evening of February 22, but they will immediately follow that up the next night by doing another show in guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw’s hometown of Montgomery, Alabama, on February 23.
Cementing the Wooden Nickel contract was a pivotal point in JY’s mind, for it legitimized the groundwork Styx had been laying down in the local clubs they’d been playing in up to that moment. “To me, there is an arc to every artist’s career,” he explains. “First, you become known initially as a performer. And then there’s the arc of, if you’re a writer, will you write your own stuff? If so, then you begin to establish yourself with new songs and new music. You may do a cover song here or there, but mostly you go with new material written by you or by others. That goes on for a while — and then you get signed.”
Besides perfecting the art of live performance, Styx was ultimately able to master the recording aspect of their career as well, especially once the aforementioned guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw joined the band when he replaced J.C. in December 1975, a mere two weeks after Equinox had been released. “At that point, we had three very distinct writing styles and writers, and it was the middle ground where we all collaborated where there was magic,” JY recounts. “That said, every career seems to have an initial creative phase like we did. Our first one started in ’72, and ran through ’83.”
If anything, that first decade of existence vaulted Styx indelibly into the pantheon of great American rock bands who continue to have an enduring impact on a truly international scale — though perhaps nobody could have predicted back then we’d still be talking about it all to such a degree 50 years later. That said, JY’s co-founding compadre in arms, bassist Chuck Panozzo, is also quite eager to try 50 on for size.
Chuck and I spent a good amount of time talking about that very golden idea while we sat together on a black leather couch in the dressing room he was sharing with JY and Tommy at The Pearl at The Palms in Las Vegas back on January 20, 2019, just a few hours before the band performed the entirety of June 2017’s The Mission for the very first time in front of a live audience. (Interestingly enough, Chuck and I had a similar deep-dive conversation on that very same couch at The Palms almost exactly a year later to the day on January 19, 2020 — but that’s a story for another time.)
“As we’ve talked about before, I plan on being here for the 50th year, and whatever comes after that,” Chuck reiterated while we both were concurrently bemused at what I can only describe as a ginormous brownie cake on a wide white plate on the table in front of us. “I remember Johnny [i.e., his late twin brother, John, who sadly passed away in 1996] and me playing together in that basement in Chicago like it was yesterday, and I felt him with me while we were rehearsing The Mission. I worked really hard to learn my parts so I wouldn’t let anybody down. I love standing out there and playing with my brothers in the band every night.”
I then told Chuck I was holding him to being fully involved as Year 50 officially commenced, and if his triumphant appearance with the band in Las Vegas during their recent residency at The Venetian and in Pompano Beach, Florida, on February 18 are any indication — the latter being deemed a “hometown gig,” as he referred to it on Instagram the following day — we’ll be seeing Chuck out on the boards with his bandmates for many more years to come.
(Incidentally, Styx will be playing at least two full Mission sets this year — one of them will be at the Beacon Theatre in New York City on March 16, and the second one will be the following night at the Warner Theatre in Washington, DC, on March 17.)
Besides our two titanic founding members, I also spoke with all other current Styx bandmembers exclusively in order to garner their feelings about our favorite band turning 50 years young. Guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw, who came on up to Chicago from his bowling alley band gig in Montgomery, Alabama, in December 1975 to replace J.C. a scant few weeks after Equinox was released, is forever grateful. “It’s been an amazing voyage. The music has stood the test of time, and it has grown over that time,” Tommy marvels. “I wasn’t there for those first few years, but I have been here for well over 40 years. When we walk off the stage, we feel like, ‘Well, we’ve done it again.’ And that’s the thing that keeps us suiting up — writing new material, recording new material, releasing it, going out and promoting it, mixing it in with the classic songs, and figuring out ways to continue to tell the story. I can’t imagine ever not doing this. You know, it’s still really nice to be here. And to think it all started with John and Chuck Panozzo — without them, we would not be having this conversation.” (Hear, hear!)
Keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan, who joined the band fulltime in 1999, recognizes the weight of the band’s long and storied history, night after night. “Styx celebrating 50 years is a momentous occasion, and I’m really proud and honored to be a part of this band’s legacy,” Lawrence says with much admiration. “It puts a big smile on my face to stand alongside JY, Chuck, Tommy, Todd, Ricky, Will, and all the musicians who’ve played a role in this group’s success since February 22, 1972. We are the culmination of the efforts of every member, past and present, and continue to hold ourselves up to that long-established high standard with each record we make, and every show we play. Half a century, and still rocking strong. Viva Styx!”
Drummer Todd Sucherman, who came aboard in 1995 to first record with the band and then joined fulltime in 1996 when John Panozzo became too ill to perform on the Return to Paradise Tour, echoes Lawrence’s sentiments with his own poignant commentary. “It’s great to be part of an organization that can have such an incredible milestone,” Todd observes. “I congratulate my musical brothers on this fantastic accomplishment, and I’m looking forward to playing many shows this year to celebrate the 50th anniversary!”
Bassist/vocalist Ricky Phillips, who joined the fold in 2003, got right to the heart of the matter. “Why has Styx lasted for 50 years? Everybody in the band does their homework — and that’s a really great thing,” Ricky notes. “It’s probably the first band I’ve ever been in where people treat everything with great care and great respect. The love we all have for each other is a brotherhood, and it’s not just when we’re onstage. We all get along, beyond all those musical reasons why we play so well together. Tommy calls it ‘a good hang,’ and that’s what we do together whenever we’re not performing.”
Finally, Styx’s newest bandmember, guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich, who came aboard fulltime during the summer of 2021, adds his own unique perspective from the POV of someone who was born just six weeks after the band’s first recording contract was signed in 1972. “What’s remarkable about it is in the way it’s evolved,” Will points out. “In fact, the band is more relevant than ever, and I think that’s a testimony to the people who are empowered in this band — Tommy Shaw and James Young, the guys who want to see a vital, creative band. It would be one thing if the music wasn’t up to the standard level of the old, great records in the Styx canon. Tommy is always keeping an eye on making sure the thread is that the music always sounds like Styx.”
To borrow a line or two from Styx’s most recent, and most excellent studio album, June 2021’s Crash of the Crown, “A new day is calling.” Happy golden anniversary, y’all — and many, many happy returns!!
DOMO ARIGATO, Y’ALL
The second of our three 2.22 milestones occurred 39 years ago today on February 22, 1983, when Styx released Kilroy Was Here, their 11th studio album, on A&M Records, which also became the last studio album they’d release before taking an extended, decade-plus hiatus until they reunited in 1995 to first record an updated version of their very first hit from the Wooden Nickel era — duly redubbed as “Lady ’95” for their Greatest Hits compilation that was released that August — and then for the ensuing Return to Paradise Tour in 1996.
Kilroy Was Here spawned a large-scale concept-oriented tour of its own, went platinum, and reached No. 3 on the Billboard Top 200 Albums chart. Kilroy also graced us with two big hit singles: “Mr. Roboto,” which itself climbed to No. 3 (and begat a quite popular concept video), and “Don’t Let It End” made it to No. 6. (A third single, “High Time,” was only able to make it to No. 48.)
Since 1999, Styx had essentially shied away from performing practically any material from Kilroy Was Here, sans a few song excerpts here and there during the lengthy “Styx Medley” the band used to perform fairly regularly a decade-plus ago — but that all changed in an instant on May 30, 2018, when, at 10:38 p.m. Pacific time, they debuted a notable, muscularly recast “Mr. Roboto” as the first song of their traditional two-song encore at Five Point Ampitheatre in Irvine, California. This was the first full-band, full-song performance of “Mr. Roboto” onstage by Styx ever, as the song was originally performed live in a purely solo fashion by Dennis DeYoung to a backing track on the 1983 Kilroy tour. An instant fan favorite, “Mr. Roboto” has since become a mainstay in the nightly encore, and it’s always followed by the band’s show-closing perma-classic, “Renegade.”
“For one thing, it was an idea whose time had come,” Tommy Shaw told me that very afternoon in May 2018, just a few hours before Styx played it in front of the unsuspecting Five Point audience. “We’ve been working on it for a while, and we wanted to get it right. It was a lot harder to learn than I thought it would be. It’s a very original, unusual, unique track — and it’s not blues-based either — but I have a feeling it will only get better from here. Know what? We’ll probably be playing it for a long time to come.” (As we all well know by now, Tommy’s not-so-secret prediction that day has since turned out to be 100 percent correct!)
Adds Chuck, “When Tommy first mentioned the idea of doing ‘Mr. Roboto,’ I thought it was a great idea. I said, ‘Why don’t we own it? We know the song is great.’ And I knew Lawrence would do a great job with it.” It’s perhaps a bit of an understatement to say Lawrence takes on the lead singing/performing role with unadulterated verve and panache by truly inhabiting the Roboto persona every night the song is performed. “Did I ever think I’d get a chance to do it?” he muses when I pose him the obvious question. “I was fine to do it all along — I really was. I think the character in the song is larger than life. I’ve found it to be pretty visceral.”
As he now enters his fourth year of playing “Mr. Roboto” in front of audiences, Gowan reiterates another key reason why he likes singing it — namely, that it reminds him so much of the same persona he inhabits in “A Criminal Mind,” his signature 1985 solo song that has since become an occasional Styx setlist favorite as well. “I realized I like singing songs where the character has something they’re hiding,” he continues. “The ‘Roboto’ vocal is from the point of view of you’re hiding something, and you’re going to reveal it to this audience, but, in fact, they’re really getting a look inside your brain — and I really like taking that point of view.” (You can also hear the Lawrence-led live version of “Roboto” on Side 2 of The Same Stardust EP that was released in June 2021 for Record Store Day.)
As the song continues to gain more and more traction, other “Roboto” fans have made their voices known. “I heard it recently, and it was so interesting. It’s such an interesting thing,” Def Leppard guitarist Phil Collen confided in me one day backstage before admitting, “I thought it was really hokey when I first heard it, but it sounded really great on the radio! What a great song!” (Domo arigato and himitsu o shiritai, as the lyrics go in Japanese. . .)
More recently, in January 2021, Tommy and I were discussing some of his favorite songs from Kilroy — and his renewed interest in revisiting them live. When I mentioned how much I personally love “Cold War,” a song that contains some of his most poignant, socially observational lyrics that continue to carry some serious weight to this very day of renewed international turmoil, Tommy replied with notable enthusiasm, “This band could totally play ‘Cold War’ live! In fact, I could hear us playing that one in my head just as you were saying that. And ‘Just Get Through This Night’ — wouldn’t that be something? We could also do ‘Haven’t We Been Here Before.’ Yeah, I love ‘Haven’t We Been Here Before.’ All we gotta do is keep waking up and put one foot in front of the other, and we’ll get there.”
(You’ll get no argument from these corners about such a great idea for live exploration, seeing how your trusty Styxologist would personally love to hear what Lawrence, Ricky, Todd, and Will could all do with the arrangements of those particular songs — especially considering they weren’t on the original Kilroy album themselves.)
Naturally, I’ve consistently semi-joked with JY that he should revive his “Dr. Righteous” persona that’s oh-so-perfectly on display in the fan-favorite Kilroy track “Heavy Metal Poisoning.” JY has yet to send me out of the room whenever I’ve brought up the thought — and he’s even quoted a lyric or two from the song back to me in that vaunted character’s voice, to boot — so, hey, you never know! (“A toxic wasteland in your ear canal,” indeed. . .)
DAMN STRAIGHT
Finally, the third 2.22 milestone signpost is that, 32 years ago on February 22, 1990, Damn Yankees released their self-titled debut on Warner Bros. Records. As most of you know, the DY supergroup configuration consisted of our man guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw, Night Ranger bassist/vocalist Jack Blades, guitarist extraordinaire Ted Nugent, and drummer Michael Cartellone (the latter of whom has played drums with Lynyrd Skynyrd since 1999). Damn Yankees has long been certified double platinum, and it reached lucky No. 13 on the album charts. “High Enough” reached No. 3 on the singles charts, while “Come Again” reached No. 50, and “Coming of Age” got to No. 60.
A few choice Damn Yankees songs have made their way into many Styx sets over the years — and, more recently, Tommy had consistently sung a few verses of “Come Again” before going into “Crystal Ball” before Crash of the Crown’s “Sound the Alarm” entered into the setlist. Not only that, but both “Coming of Age” and “High Enough” were re-recorded by Styx for inclusion on their 2011 Regeneration Volume II CD. (And please take note — both tracks also happened to see some key production guidance from none other than Will Evankovich.)
“High Enough” even made a fully unplugged acoustic appearance during the blackout half of Styx’s show at the Sunset Center in Carmel, California, back on January 16, 2019. And by now, you’ve likely seen Tommy’s totally galvanized solo version of “Come Again” as performed in his home studio in Nashville in mid-2020, a performance that was a main fixture during some of the set breaks and/or post-show codas that became intrinsic parts of some of the entries in the band’s popular Styx Fix YouTube concert series in 2020.
“I’ve always been a fan of both Tommy Shaw and Styx, and we did very well with the Damn Yankees,” Ron Nevison, the man who produced both Damn Yankees and their August 1992 followup, Don’t Tread, told me during our interview in June 2016. “I liked all of the original demos for songs like ‘Come Again,’ and ‘Coming of Age,’ but I thought ‘High Enough’ was the coup de grace. After I heard ‘High Enough,’ I flipped out, and I told the label I wanted to do the album.” (And who could blame him?)
THE ENDURING POWER OF 2.22
At any rate, the perfectly harmonious date of 2.22 also dovetails quite nicely in parallel with the pivotal release date of Styx’s seminal seventh album, The Grand Illusion, on 7.7.77 — just like they planned it! In the meantime, while you’re letting all of this super calendrical symmetry sink in, let us one and all raise a collective glass to toast 50 years of Styx — a true milestone in the history of our favorite rock band! Who knows what the next half-century will bring?
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Celebrating the ongoing resonance of Styx’s first full-length studio album of the 2000s, which was released on February 18, 2003.
by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Cyclorama, Styx’s 14th studio album and their first full-length collection of all-original material of the 2000s, was released 19 years ago today on February 18, 2003 by Sanctuary/CMC International. The album was produced by Tommy Shaw, James Young, and Gary Loizzo, and it contains such enduring tracks as “One With Everything,” “These Are the Times,” “Yes I Can,” “More Love for the Money,” and “Fields of the Brave.”
Cyclorama — which also saw a wonderfully enveloping 5.1 surround-sound mix done by the late, great Loizzo for both the DVD-Audio and DualDisc formats via the Silverline label — reached No. 127 on The Billboard 200 Albums chart. On the singles front, one Cyclorama song, “Waiting for Our Time,” reached No. 37 on the Mainstream Rock Tracks chart. Cyclorama wouldn’t be followed up by another all-original Styx studio album until 14 years later, with the June 2017 release of The Mission.
Almost 18 months ago to the day — at 12 p.m. Eastern time on August 21, 2020, to be exact — a new animated lyric video treatment for the aforementioned “These Are the Times” was unveiled on Styx’s YouTube channel to coincide with Cyclorama’s 2020 debut on all major download and streaming platforms. The video was directed by longtime band associate Steve Jones, a lifelong friend of co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young. Jones also happens to be an accomplished film producer to boot (see Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer and Mad Dog and Glory, to name but a few). If you haven’t seen the gripping “These Are the Times” clip yet, or would like to revisit it like you know you should, you can check it out here.
JY continues to have great admiration for “These Are the Times,” as he recently told me when we talked about the videoclip. “It’s a really great song, and I had kind of forgotten about it because Cyclorama was really kind of lost,” JY admits. “So, the notion of turning that song into a video was really [Styx manager] Charlie Brusco’s idea, but it was inspired by the video for ‘Brave New World’ [another Steve Jones creation that premiered on Styx’s YouTube channel back on July 23, 2020, which you can watch right here]. You know, we have some really great songs that we now have the ability to make great videos for, dirt cheap!” JY concludes with his signature laugh. “And I just really wanted to do something here with that one.”
In a Styxworld exclusive, in addition to some more JY comments from, guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw, keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan, drummer Todd Sucherman, former bandmember Glen Burtnik, the late producer Gary Loizzo, drum tech Paul Carrizzo, and lighting director/designer Libby Gray all chime in to tell us the tale of how Cyclorama came to be, and how it continues to live on in our hearts and minds today. Somewhere down the road that we follow / We’ll be one with everything. . .
Tommy Shaw: Cyclorama was a fun record to make. It was a real “California experience” type of record. We recorded some of the vocals standing outside. That was in my home studio up in Beachwood Canyon in Los Angeles, where I lived for quite a few years before moving to Nashville. After we released the album, we went on a great tour with Journey and REO Speedwagon, and sold out arenas all across the country [from May to August 2003].
Lawrence [Gowan] had been in the band for three years at that point, and it was our first album with him. We didn’t realize it at the time, but Glen [Burtnik] would be leaving that year around my birthday in September, and that was when [bassist/vocalist] Ricky Phillips came into the picture. [Ricky joined Styx fulltime in October 2003.]
I remember both Lawrence and me standing underneath a palm tree, getting this great vocal sound outside. It’s something we learned from [Damn Yankees producer/engineer] Ron Nevison, who had told us about recording Paul Rodgers outside singing the song “Bad Company.” So, we tried it — and we loved it.
Lawrence Gowan: Since 2010, a lot of Styx fans in the U.S. have said to me, “How come you don’t do solo shows in America?” So, in 2015, I began doing some solo shows in the States where I combined material from my solo life with some Styx songs. I don’t know why, but I had overlooked playing some songs from Cyclorama, and it was amazing how many people were yelling out for “More Love for the Money” and “Fields of the Brave.”
Now, I hadn’t played those songs in so many years. I took a stab at “More Love for the Money,” and that went well. It was a learning thing for me, and it was the first time I had done a full solo show in the United States [in Nottingham, Maryland, on December 16, 2015]. I realized that, for a lot of the audience, Cyclorama is in their lexicon as much as anything is from the Styx catalog, so I better address that, you know? Once I got another chance to do the solo thing again, I began thinking about including those songs in my solo sets in their full versions.
Tommy Shaw: We had a great time jamming on those songs. “One With Everything” was this amazing song that went through all sorts of changes. It had a different name at first — something crazy, like “My Beautiful Pompeii.” That was one of those songs where my wife Jeanne would come over and I’d say, “Listen to this song!” We’d start playing it and she’d go, “What the hell — ‘Pompeii’? What??” (laughs heartily) We realized at that point in our enthusiastic joy of creating this great piece of music that we hadn’t really thought about what we were singing! (laughs again)
So, there was a quick rewrite to “One With Everything” — which actually had a great deal of meaning. It’s one of our favorite things to play whenever we can fit it into the set, especially because of the great, progressive middle section that’s in there.
Todd Sucherman: I might be biased, but Cyclorama really surpassed my expectations. In fact, some of the more overt moments on [June 2021’s] Crash of the Crown are probably the most overt I’ve done since the big fills I did on “One With Everything.” And everyone in the band really shines on that track. It’s an epic piece that was really something to work on. There’s definitely a tip of the hat to the prog/art rock side of the band on that one.
Paul Carrizzo (Todd Sucherman’s drum tech for 20-plus years, and counting): When we did the Cyclorama album, Todd, Tommy, and JY all said they wanted Paulie in the studio. I was new in the camp, and I wasn’t yet familiar with the songs — but the thing I said to each of them was, “Give me a song you want this snare drum to sound like. Name a song familiar to you so I can have that kind of snare drum in mind — and I’ll get it for you.” And that’s we did.
Tommy Shaw: “Yes I Can” was another one of those California-based songs. The imagery is the California scene. And speaking of California, our friend Billy Bob Thornton makes an appearance [doing lead vocals on “Bourgeois Pig”], and Tenacious D is in there somewhere too! [Jack Black and Kyle Gass — a.k.a. Tenacious D — appear on the hidden track “The Chosen One,” which follows directly after “Genki Desu Ka.”]
Right up until we began incorporating songs from The Mission into our set a few years ago, we used the song “Genki Desu Ka” as our walk-off music. “Genki Desu Ka” is Japanese — a very polite way of saying, “Do you feel good?”
Todd Sucherman: When Styx did Live With Regis and Kelly [on July 29, 2003] to perform “Yes I Can,” we were sort of like the house band. I was like the MD [musical director] calling the bumpers [the music the band played during the commercial breaks] in and out back then, so I knew what I was getting myself into once I got the call to be a guest drummer on Late Night With Seth Meyers [in 2018, and again in 2020].
Tommy Shaw: Cyclorama also had this great Storm Thorgerson album cover, our final Storm album cover. He and his team did [September 1978’s] Pieces of Eight as well. We were proud to be associated with him and his great, iconic album covers.
[Your Styxologist clarifies: Storm Thorgerson, who passed away on April 18, 2013, is perhaps best known for designing album covers and related artwork for the likes of Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin with partner Aubrey Powell in the British graphic design firm Hipgnosis. For his part, Powell was directly involved in the Pieces of Eight cover design.]
Libby Gray (longtime Styx lighting director/designer): During “Too Much Time on My Hands” in our live show, it probably doesn’t register to the casual fan it’s the Cyclorama bunny clock that’s up there for five or six seconds on the video wall. It probably doesn’t register that the clock spinning around is on the cover art for the Cyclorama album — and that’s ok. I’m not going to put the word Cyclorama under it, and I’m not gonna hit you over the head with it. But it’s a gift for the people who do understand, and then go (exclaims), “Really! Wow!! I haven’t seen that cover in about 10 years!”
Glen Burtnik (bassist/guitarist/vocalist who also sang lead vocals on “Kiss Your Ass Goodbye” and “Killing the Thing That You Love,” and ultimately left Styx in September 2003): The thing with Cyclorama is, that was a really excellent experience. I think it’s a really good album. It was a real collaboration, especially “One With Everything.” That was a real collaboration between everyone in the band. All of us were involved in that one. I enjoyed that experience, and I think Todd [Sucherman] plays great on it. Yeah, I like that album a lot. It’s probably my favorite Styx album. (laughs) It was a pleasure to be in Styx, and probably the most professional act I’ve ever worked with. It’s a good machine. It’s a very impressive run this band from the Midwest has had.
Gary Loizzo (Styx’s longtime producer/live engineer who passed away from cancer in January 2016): Tommy — he’s always into experimenting. (laughs) That’s just the way he is, and it always worked out for the best — especially on our later records, like Cyclorama. To me, Cyclorama was one of the better records we recorded. Never to be heard, really — but I know I enjoyed it when I recorded it, and that was the closest I ever was with the band. A truly, truly great experience. I enjoyed working with Glen Burtnik too. What a great talent.
There’s great songwriting on Cyclorama, with a great representation of sounds. They were experimenting with many really good musical ideas. I really, really enjoyed that album, and I think it never got the recognition I think it deserved.
James “JY” Young: Cyclorama is a great record. But there was just no way for it to get traction back in those days.
Tommy Shaw: Cyclorama was kind of an experimental record, just to see where we were as a band after having reformed in 1999. We were stretching our legs in the studio, and there was a lot of growth and moving forward. That’s how I look at that album. Whenever I think of Cyclorama, it puts a smile on my face.
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Today’s the day Paradise Theatre first made history when it was released 41 years ago on January 19, 1981.
by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Is it any wonder that Paradise Theatre made such a lasting impression when it was released 41 years ago today by A&M Records on January 19, 1981? In fact, Paradise Theatre (or Theater, depending on which part of the album sleeve you’re viewing) was Styx’s first album to reach No. 1, which it did for three non-consecutive weeks on the Billboard Top 200 Albums chart not too long after its initial release. It ultimately sold over 3 million copies, making it Styx’s fourth multiplatinum album in a row — the first time any rock band in history had ever achieved such a vaunted sales feat.
“I can hardly keep track of all our anniversaries,” admits guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw with a hearty laugh, “but I really do love how much Paradise Theatre has endured, and I appreciate all the ways the fans continue to embrace this music of ours.”
Onward to the facts, then: Paradise Theatre, Styx’s tenth studio album, was recorded, engineered, and mixed in 1980 at Pumpkin Studios in Oak Lawn, Illinois, with the late, great Gary Loizzo at the helm. (Loizzo passed away six years ago after a long battle with cancer on January 16, 2016.)
The album’s tone was set by the wistful bookends “A.D. 1928” and “A.D. 1958” — as well as, of course, its final 27 seconds, Dennis DeYoung’s wonderful Vaudevillian piano outro “State Street Sadie” (a particular favorite track of Styx’s keyboardist/vocalist since 1999, Lawrence Gowan) — all serving to frame a concept album that chronicled the glorious opening and eventual glum closing of a fictional Chicago theater.
“I know exactly physically what building I was in when I wrote that riff for ‘Rockin’ the Paradise,’” says co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young. “I still drive by it sometimes in the south suburbs of Chicago, where we were rehearsing at the time. Tommy came up with the verse, and Dennis came up with the lyrics — and there it was.”
Adds co-founding original bassist Chuck Panozzo, “Paradise Theatre really captured us at our best, when everyone was working towards achieving a common goal. And now I like that we’re able to recreate that feeling of rocking the paradise onstage every night with the people we have in the band.”
Two huge singles emerged from the record. Keyboardist/vocalist DeYoung’s touchingly reflective “The Best of Times” — JY’s self-admitted favorite DeYoung ballad, in fact — made it all the way to No. 3, and Shaw’s instantly iconic “Too Much Time on My Hands” reached No. 9. “Too Much Time” remains a crowd favorite to this day, and it appears prominently in every Styx live set. “It was like the song was playing in my head,” Tommy recalls of writing “Too Much Time” on the literal last day of recording for the album. “I heard that riff in my head, but I didn’t have anything to record it on as I was driving to the studio. When I got to the parking lot, I turned the car off, ran inside, got everybody together, and said, ‘Chuck, play this riff, and then do this.’ It was like it came together in a package, and all the pieces were assembled right then and there.”
“Too Much Time on My Hands” has garnered much additional pop-culture cache in the ensuing years. Back in April 2016, for example, Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon began singing snippets of the song during his post-monologue, show-opening desk pieces (“I’ve got the 12 o’clock news blues!”), with house band The Roots picking up the beat to riff on it right alongside him. “I was impressed with Jimmy’s vocals — and the band did a fine job on it too,” Tommy told me at the time.
Soon enough, Fallon and his Tonight Show team created a frame-by-frame remake of most of the song’s instant-classic concept video imagery that had made it an unabashed early MTV staple, with Fallon taking on DeYoung’s “vested” role and Paul Rudd (Ant-Man, Ghostbusters: Afterlife) donning the infamous blue jumpsuit and requisite blonde wig to replicate that perfect of-era Tommy Shaw look. You can see their video homage in a side-by-side comparison with the original clip right here.
Then, in December 2020, and in support of Steelers Nation, our man Shaw — along with fellow current Styx bandmembers JY, Chuck, Lawrence, drummer Todd Sucherman, and bassist Ricky Phillips — took to Zoom to collectively perform an updated remake of the song for our modern times, in a video and audio package produced by the band’s formidable live engineer, Chris “Cookie” Hoff. You can watch that energetic and quite kinetic version of “Too Much Time” on Styx’s official YouTube channel, right here.
Something else Hoff discovered about “Too Much Time” came into play more recently, not long after guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich became a fulltime member of Styx this past summer. “Cookie said, ‘If you listen to the original version of “Too Much Time,” there’s some weird, flanged kind of clean guitar part going on,’” Will told me recently on our own Zoom call, then played the song’s signature riff on the guitar he had in his lap to illustrate the point sonically. “And that guitar is playing along with the keyboard! I never really noticed it — but it is with the guitar, so I said, ‘Well, I’ll do that! No one’s doing that, so I’ll do that.’ And once you add that into the live mix, suddenly, it sounds more ‘authentic,’ and more like the original recording.” (It does, indeed — and you can hear Will adding in that extra, sweet guitaristic texture every time “Too Much Time” is now played onstage.)
Other classic Paradise cuts continue to be performed live by the band, including the aforementioned “Rockin’ the Paradise,” which has since turned into a top-hatted Lawrence Gowan performance showcase — and a song that also has the fine distinction of being the 10th video ever shown on MTV on the very day the music channel debuted on U.S. cable systems on August 1, 1981.
“It reminded me of the kind of song Elton John was doing in the early ’70s. That’s how it felt to me, and I fell in love with it immediately,” admits Lawrence. “It’s a dissertation, that lyric. And it’s very uplifting, very positive. Live, it’s an over-the-top performance where I realized, yeah, I could really rev up this character. I’d done a kind of ringmaster-y character myself in the past, and these lyrics fit with that idea. I also thought I might be able to get away with a sequined coat on that one! (chuckles) It’s a song where I’d like to play piano from top to bottom, but the only spot where I can get away with it and still be the showman is in the middle.”
And then there’s “Snowblind,” which had returned to the live set for the first time in a number of years in early 2016 and subsequently became a setlist favorite during Renegades in the Fast Lane, the band's five-show residential run alongside Don Felder, which was held at the Venetian Theatre in Las Vegas between January 6-14, 2017. “Snowblind” also made occasional appearances as part of Styx’s first round of live sets in January 2020, with Young’s effects-laden lead vocal as eerie/creepy as ever, perfectly countered by Shaw’s atmospherically cool wah-wah guitar tone during the “Mirror, mirror” verses.
Observes Chuck, “That was the first time I played bass pedals on a song. We were doing some things that really took us out of our comfort zone.” Notes JY, “When you sing the soft parts of a song, you get to hear the crowd singing with you. A number of years ago, when I started singing the line, Mirror, mirror,’ I got to hear the whole place singing along with me for the first time. I had never experienced that before. It was like, ‘Holy crap! This song has touched a lot of people.’ It keeps resonating.”
Incidentally, many astute listeners have observed how the title track of Styx’s latest album Crash of the Crown shares a particular unique element with “Snowblind” in that they both feature more than one Styx bandmember taking lead vocal turns during the same song — a truly rare occurrence in the Styx canon. To wit: “Snowblind” features JY and Tommy sharing its main vocal duties (i.e., with JY leading the verses, and Tommy leading the choruses), while “Crash” rotates amongst JY on the main verses, Tommy on the stacked vocal break, and Lawrence taking the final verse home.
The only other “dual” vocal contender in the Styx catalog per se would be “Superstars,” from July 1977’s The Grand Illusion, which features Shaw on lead vocals and DeYoung turning in the spoken word break. That being said, JY, who has been the one to handle the spoken word portion himself on the rare occasion “Superstars” gets into the live set like it did a few years ago, discounts its inclusion in this rare song club since that particular part is spoken and not sung — and who are we to argue with The Godfather of Styx?
On another note, a number of Styx’s contemporaries absolutely love the music of Paradise Theatre — especially when it comes to the aforementioned “Too Much Time on My Hands.” Among the musical admirers of “Too Much Time” whom I’ve personally spoken with include Cheap Trick guitarist Rick Nielsen (“It’s my favorite Styx song”), America co-founder Gerry Beckley (“That’s a great tune!”), and Chicago bassist/vocalist Jason Scheff (“It really impacted me in the ’80s”). As Sammy Hagar oh-so-succinctly told me about “Too Much Time” in March 2017, “That is my favorite Styx song. Yeah, I really like that song. I like it melodically, and I like the way the riff goes, and the groove. If I ever did do a Styx cover song, that’s the one I’d go ahead and do. That ain’t a B song!”
An extensive international tour quickly followed the album’s release in 1981, encompassing over 100 shows in North America and 14 European gigs, as well as a pair of tour-closing dates at the legendary Budokan in Tokyo, Japan, in January 1982. The Japanese shows are especially notable because the setlist included traditional Japanese songs “Sakura Sakura” and “Sukiyaki,” which featured Tommy playing a koto, a zither-like instrument he bought locally and learned to play in his hotel room. “My most fond memories of Paradise Theatre were when we put it up as a show, and we played it onstage,” Tommy recalls. “I had never seen a backdrop like that — where you’d see one thing when it was lit from the back, and then see something totally different when it was lit from the front. It was just magical.”
One particularly auspicious and serendipitous U.S. performance on the Paradise Theatre Tour took place on August 25, 1981 at the Roanoke Civic Center in Roanoke, Virginia. Not only was that concert the very first Styx show ever attended by yours truly, your trusty Styxologist, but it was also attended by Todd Gallopo, the owner and creative director of meat and potatoes – design and branding (all-lowercase letters intended). Gallopo happens to be the man responsible for the album design and visual conceptualization for Styx’s two most recent studio albums — namely, June 2017’s The Mission and June 2021’s Crash of the Crown — as well as other catalog releases in the Styx canon under the Universal/UMe umbrella including August 2003’s Rockers compilation, May 2004’s Come Sail Away: The Styx Anthology, and May 2005’s Big Bang Theory.
“My mom and I went to that show in Roanoke, along with my best friend, who I played hockey with,” Gallopo told me in May 2019. “It was the first show I ever saw. I don’t have my ticket anymore, but that was the first concert I ever went to. I was way into Styx at the time. I was a young kid playing my own music, and Styx was cool. And that show was also about a week and a half after my birthday. It’s amazing you were there too! Going way back like that, you can see the full circle that happened between Styx and me.” (Without a doubt, brother Todd — without a doubt!)
Finally, we must share a few words about the album’s initial vinyl release. In that regard, adding to the overall Paradise coolness factor was the laser-etching of the band’s name along with some theater flourishes on the label-less Side 2. “That was done to thwart bootleggers, which was a big problem back then,” reveals Tommy. (These etchings can also be found on some, though not all, subsequent Paradise Theatre vinyl reissues — so if you’re looking into buying a used and/or vintage copy, always check for the etching to ensure you’re getting the exact right version!)
The 41 years since Paradise Theatre first graced our presence at times seems to have come and gone in a flash — but all of this wonderfully majestic detail, of course, serves well to keep alive the memories of Paradise. We all trust you’ll enjoy rediscovering it for yourselves.
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It’s been four years since legendary rockers REO Speedwagon and Styx joined forces for a summer co-headlining tour. While the world has changed since then, fans’ desire to rock out hasn’t. Styx and REO Speedwagon are telling you to close those laptops and get out of your sweatpants, because they’re set to once again bring their rock & roll classics to the masses, this time with special guest Loverboy for the “Live & UnZoomed” tour that kicks off May 31, 2022 in Grand Rapids, MI at the Van Andel Arena.
Tommy Shaw agrees, “I can’t think of a better way of touring the USA next year than with good friends we’ve known for years and performed with on many a stage. What a great night of music this will be!”
Check out this video to learn more about the REO Speedwagon/Styx/Loverboy “Live & UnZoomed” tour.
Tickets for various cities of the trek will go on sale starting Friday, December 10 at 10am local time on LiveNation.com. Styx VIP packages and fan club member pre-sales begin Monday, December 6 at 10am local time.
Tue 5/31 Grand Rapids, MI Van Andel Arena - REO Speedwagon closes
Wed 6/1 Cuyahoga Falls, OH Blossom Music Center - Styx closes
Fri 6/3 St. Louis, MO Hollywood Casino Amp. - REO Speedwagon closes
Sat 6/4 Tinley Park, IL Hollywood Casino Amp. - Styx closes
Tue 6/7 Milwaukee, WI American Family Insurance Amp. - REO Speedwagon closes
Wed 6/8 Clarkston, MI DTE Energy Music Theatre - Styx closes
Fri 6/10 Noblesville, IN Ruoff Music Center - REO Speedwagon closes
Sat 6/11 Cincinnati, OH Riverbend Music Center - Styx closes
Mon 6/13 Rogers, AR Walmart Amphitheatre - REO Speedwagon* closes
Tue 6/14 Kansas City, MO Starlight Theatre - REO Speedwagon closes
Fri 6/17 Alpharetta, GA Ameris Bank Amphitheatre - Styx closes
Sat 6/18 Tampa, FL MIDFLORIDA Credit Union Amp. - REO Speedwagon closes
Sun 6/19 West Palm Beach, FL iTHINK Financial Amphitheatre - Styx closes
Fri 7/8 Denver, CO Ball Arena - Styx closes
Sat 7/9 Salt Lake City, UT USANA Amphitheatre - REO Speedwagon closes
Tue 7/12 Auburn, WA White River Amphitheatre - REO Speedwagon closes
Wed 7/13 Ridgefield, WA RV Inn Style Resorts Amp. - Styx closes
Fri 7/15 Mountain View, CA Shoreline Amphitheatre - Styx closes
Sat 7/16 Irvine, CA Five Point Amphitheatre - REO Speedwagon closes
Tue 7/19 Chula Vista, CA North Island Credit Union Amp. - Styx closes
Wed 7/20 Phoenix, AZ Ak-Chin Pavilion - REO Speedwagon closes
Fri 7/22 Austin, TX Germainia Insurance Amp. - Styx closes
Sat 7/23 Dallas, TX Dos Equis Pavilion - Styx closes
Sun 7/24 Woodlands, TX Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion - REO Speedwagon closes
Fri 8/5 Virginia Beach, VA Veterans United Home Loans Amp. - REO Speedwagon closes
Sat 8/6 Charlotte, NC PNC Music Pavilion - Styx closes
Mon 8/8 Nashville, TN Ascend Amphitheater - Styx closes
Wed 8/10 Raleigh, NC Coastal Credit Union Music Park - REO Speedwagon closes
Fri 8/12 Bristow, VA Jiffy Lube Live - REO Speedwagon closes
Sat 8/13 Camden, NJ BB&T Pavilion - Styx closes
Tue 8/16 Toronto, ONT. Budweiser Stage - Styx closes
Wed 8/17 Saratoga Springs, NY Saratoga Performing Arts Center - REO Speedwagon closes
Fri 8/19 Mansfield, MA Xfinity Center - Styx closes
Sat 8/20 Holmdel, NJ PNC Bank Arts Center - Styx closes
Sun 8/21 Wantagh, NY Northwell Health at Jones Beach Theater - REO Speedwagon closes
*Goes on Sale at 12pm local time on December 10.
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Sweet, sweet sounds fill the air: Join us in our celebration of Styx’s mighty Equinox, which was released 46 years ago today on December 1, 1975.
Equinox, Styx’s fifth studio album, was released 46 years ago today on December 1, 1975. Equinox was also the band’s first album on a major label, A&M Records, opening the door for their subsequent, best-selling international success. (Under their original recording contract, Styx’s first four LPs were released on Wooden Nickel Records, a Chicago-based independent record label.)
Equinox ultimately reached No. 58 on the Billboard 200 albums chart in 1976, and has since been certified by the RIAA as achieving Gold status, or 500,000 copies sold. (We demand a recertification to bring Equinox up to what we truly believe is its fully deserved and justified platinum-selling status, STAT!) The album’s lone single, “Lorelei,” reached No. 36 in the U.S. and No. 6 in Canada, also in 1976.
Right out of the gate, Equinox's lead track, “Light Up,” fused Styx’s best instincts for how to blend harmonies, keyboard hooks, and power chords together to memorable effect, resulting in a song that continues to grace many of Styx’s live setlists (usually accompanied with a quite incredible audience-generated visual effect to boot). Two other hard-driving singalong Equinox songs, “Lorelei” and “Suite Madame Blue,” are also in regular live rotation.
“Equinox really was the start of some great records for A&M,” says Styx co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young, the man who now takes “Lorelei” to new lead-vocal heights whenever the band is onstage. “We had an evolved sense of who we were, and what we could accomplish. And our goals were then set that much higher. In the context of Styx, I think it all came together on that record.”
In the wake of the album’s release, however, Styx also had to deal with an impending personnel change. “The first time I ever heard anything from Equinox was at my audition for the band in Chicago,” clarifies guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw, who joined Styx in mid-December 1975 right as the band was set to go out on tour. Tommy came on up from his homebase in Montgomery, Alabama, in order to replace then recently departed guitarist/vocalist John “JC” Curulewski, an original Styx bandmember. “The first thing I heard,” Tommy continues, “was JY singing ‘Midnight Ride,’ which just blew me away.” (Oh, if only we could all hear “Midnight Ride” grace some future Styx sets. . . paging JY!!)
JY points out that, after having cut November 1974’s Man of Miracles at Golden Voice Studios in South Pekin, Illinois, on a budget, recording Equinox at Paragon Studios in Chicago with ace producer Barry Mraz at the controls was clear evidence things had already very much changed for Styx. “We went in there with tremendous confidence of our own validity, and I think the album sounds like it,” JY reports. “For one thing, it was the first time I played a Marshall amplifier, ever, in the studio. I always wanted to sound like The Who — and to me, this is the album that really sounds like The Who. ‘Lorelei’ — you can totally hear The Who there. ‘Light Up’ — [original keyboardist/vocalist] Dennis DeYoung gets the credit for [JY hums the song’s signature keyboard-and-guitar intro], but adding the power chords between the phrases is something [legendary Who guitarist Pete] Townshend trademarked. Thank you, Pete! We happily lifted that.”
Coming on the heels of the aforementioned Man of Miracles, Equinox truly set the template for where Styx was going next. “Man of Miracles is raw Styx,” observes Tommy. “I’d listened to that stuff and I knew it was raw, rocking, and melodic. But Equinox was refined. Styx had just evolved. From writing to performing to making records — everything just really fell into place on that record. ‘Lonely Child’ and ‘Mother Dear,’ ‘Prelude 12’ and ‘Suite Madame Blue’ — it was all just very daring, and you didn’t know what was coming next, from ‘Midnight Ride’ to ‘Suite Madame Blue.’ There weren’t that many songs on the record [in fact, there’s only eight of them], but they were all big songs.”
The album’s cover art was also very important in making a statement about Styx’s ongoing evolution. “On the cover, you see the cube in the fire, and I really, really liked it because it was transitional,” admits Styx co-founding bassist Chuck Panozzo. “And equinox can also mean the change between seasons, which I like too. Equinox left me with a good feeling about where we were going as a band. We, as musicians, were becoming extremely professional about what we were doing. It was one of those life-changing events. You could feel it — even if you didn’t know exactly what was coming.”
Incidentally, if you think the enigmatic “The Age of Entropia,” one of the two exclusive studio tracks that appears on Side 1 of Styx’s June 2021 Record Store Day EP The Same Stardust, feels like it could have actually been a long lost Equinox outtake, you wouldn’t be that far off the mark. “I totally agree,” concurs Will Evankovich, the co-author of “Entropia” along with Tommy Shaw who served as the EP’s studio tracks producer and is also the most recently anointed fulltime Styx bandmember. Continues Will, “You’re absolutely right. ‘Entropia’ does have some Equinox feel to it. It’s in 6/8 with minor arpeggios, and it is its own animal.” (Now you know!)
Canada actually embraced Equinox somewhat earlier than the United States did, a phenomenon not lost on longtime Canadian resident and Styx keyboardist/vocalist for the past 22 years and counting, Lawrence Gowan. “Well, ‘Lorelei’ was on Canadian radio, and that’s where I first became aware of the band,” confirms Gowan, who joined Styx in 1999. “In Ontario, we didn’t have ‘Suite Madame Blue’ — we had ‘Lorelei.’ And when I heard it, I remember going, ‘Oh, what band is this?’ — because I thought they were British. I was into anything that had synthesizer on it from that era, and I had just started learning the names of synthesizers then. So about ‘Lorelei,’ I’d go, ‘That sounds like the ARP 2500 that was on The Who’s ‘Baba O’Riley.’ “
Continues Gowan, “When ‘Lorelei’ came on the radio, I really liked it right off the bat. I thought, ‘Hmmm!’ And when I found out they were American, I thought, ‘That’s the first progressive rock band not from the U.K. to suddenly be noticed.’ And,” Gowan adds with his signature mischievous chuckle, “I had a feeling I better learn these songs, because (slight pause) . . . you never know.”
You never know indeed. And now, during many an exciting extended-set Styx live gig, you can hear Mr. Gowan take full charge of “Suite Madame Blue” as he moves from behind his keyboard to the top of the elevated stage perch positioned up behind drummer Todd Sucherman, with full, rich harmonies in tow by all other singing Styx members, including JY, Tommy, bassist Ricky Phillips, and guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich. So light up, everybody, and keep basking in the that eternal ice-fire glow that Equinox provides upon each and every listen.
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by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
One With Everything: Styx and the Contemporary Youth Orchestra, Styx’s seventh live album, was released by NewDoor/UMe 15 years ago today on November 14, 2006. It also shares a birthday with The Godfather of Styx, co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young, who was born on November 14, 1949. Happy 72nd birthday, JY!
One With Everything emerged from a truly magical show Styx played with the Contemporary Youth Orchestra at the Blossom Music Center in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, on May 25, 2006. From the opening rush of guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw’s “Blue Collar Man” to the majesty of the JY-led cover of Willie Dixon’s “It Don't Make Sense (You Can’t Make Peace)” to keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan’s ever-haunting “A Criminal Mind” to the uplifting, all-in “Renegade” finale, One With Everything has, well, just about everything a Styx fan could want. In addition to recurrent airings on PBS affiliates and AXS TV, this special concert event is available on Blu-ray, DVD, and CD. Here’s hoping the ongoing vinyl revival inspires the powers that be at UMe HQ to commission a 180-gram 2LP release somewhere down the line. (How about it, folks?)
Orchestral highlights of this epic performance include violinist extraordinaire Lavinia Pavlish joyously trading licks with JY on “It Don’t Make Sense” — “Give Lavinia some love!” Tommy exclaims at the song’s conclusion — as well as cello co-principals David B. Ellis and Eric Tannenbaum trading licks quite furiously together during the intro to “Fooling Yourself.”
“Oh man — that was the highlight of my 17-year-old self!” Lavinia told me about how it felt playing “It Don’t Make Sense” onstage with Styx. “The solo was a written part, but JY is such an awesome musical communicator. He made me look good. It was all him,” continued the ever-humble violinist with a chuckle. “Some of their songs are so beautiful, and that song is so amazing.”
Added David B. Ellis, seen above with his onetime CYO contemporary, Lavinia, “That concert is one of the favorite ones I’ve ever done, and I especially loved the massive dueling cello thing between me and my friend Eric Tannenbaum.” (We do too, David!)
The amazing Everything event came about due to the sheer will of then-CYO conductor Liza Grossman, who has since become Styx’s official de facto conductor any time the band performs with an orchestra. In fact, Liza was at the podium when Styx did a pair of shows at the Schermerhorn Symphony Center in Nashville in February 2015, and once again when they were at the beautiful outdoor Ascend Ampitheatre on May 21, 2016, along with the Nashville Symphony.
Liza also helmed Tommy Shaw’s solo turn with the CYO at the Waetjen Auditorium at Cleveland State University on May 27, 2016 (which was subsequently made available as Sing for the Day! on CD and Blu-ray on June 29, 2018), and she subsequently conducted Styx and the world-class Colorado Symphony at the historic Red Rocks Ampitheatre in Morrison, Colorado, on August 29, 2016, an evening both Liza and Styx continue to feel are career highlights. Your trusty Styxologist was onsite and watching from the sidestage area on Lawrence’s side during that very same Red Rocks show, and I wholeheartedly concur with that assessment.
[Your Styxologist further clarifies: After parting ways with CYO in 2020, Liza has since gone on to co-found Kaboom Collective, a stellar organization that offers in-person performances, production opportunities, and industry classes for, to quote their official site, “motivated musicians and artists ages 15-25 who want to experience multi-disciplinary education and are curious about the arts and entertainment industry and want to advance their pre-professional development.” Go here for more information about the wonderful wide world of Kaboom, and all it has to offer. Who knows — you might even find yours truly listed in the industry experts/instructors section that’s dubbed “The Collective”. . .]
“She just shined,” Tommy recalls about rehearsing and playing with Liza and the CYO in 2006. “She was a rock star from the way she took the stage and presented herself, and the respect she got from her kids. It was just a treat working with her. It was clear from the beginning she was an engaging and enthusiastic person, and the Contemporary Youth Orchestra was her creation, her idea, and her dream. She put it all together. We just love her, and we’ve continued to support whatever Liza does because it’s such an awesome thing.”
Liza herself looks back on One With Everything with much personal and professional joy. “I still get, to this day, emails from fans who love that DVD and love that show, and then they ask me about specific players in that orchestra: ‘Where are they now? What is she doing? What is he doing?’” Liza recounted to me before she left her position with the CYO last year. (In case you’re wondering, Lavinia currently resides and works as a musician and violinist in New York City, while David B. Ellis is a freelance musician, cellist, viola da gambist, and conductor who has played with The Cleveland Baroque Orchestra, among other things.)
Continued Liza, “I had been showing One With Everything to the musicians who were in [the later incarnations of] CYO. The youngest members of the orchestra were babies between the ages of 3 and 8 when we first did this, so they hadn’t seen it. I think it’s important they understand it and see there’s a history to it. It gives them a chance to see how relationships can develop with musicians who are already at a certain level in their careers. I think it’s going to be really effective for them. Since then, the orchestra has evolved immensely — and, hopefully, I have as an educator and a conductor as well. I certainly know the bandmembers in Styx have evolved as musicians.”
Could there be a better-named project than One With Everything? Time for everyone to commence a Styx & CYO refresher course right now, sayeth I! Smiling ear to ear, it’s something in the atmosphere. . .
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by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Man of Miracles, Styx’s fourth studio album, was released 47 years ago today by Wooden Nickel Records on November 8, 1974. Man of Miracles was the band’s final album under their original contract with Wooden Nickel, the Chicago-based independent record label, before they moved into the big leagues with noted major label A&M Records for an impressive run of releases that started with December 1975’s Equinox — the first album wherein Styx found their true, collective studio acumen and songwriting footing.
Man of Miracles — which was named, as many Styx albums have been, by co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young — showed the band beginning to stretch their creative muscles even further in the studio, albeit with their fair share of hits and misses. Miracles was recorded at Golden Voice Studios in South Pekin, Illinois, and remixed at Paragon Recording Studios in Chicago. It was produced by John Ryan for Chicago Kid Productions in cooperation with Bill Traut and engineered by Gary Loizzo. Loizzo went on to engineer and co-produce a good number of the band’s subsequent albums and later served as their longtime live engineer, right up until his passing in January 2016.
Miracles ultimately peaked at No. 154 on Billboard’s Top 200 Albums chart, which was 38 positions higher than where their previous album, October 1973’s The Serpent Is Rising, had landed.
“I love the opulence of the title song,” notes original, co-founding Styx bassist Chuck Panozzo about the ever-soaring “Man of Miracles” (which appears as the last track on Side 2 of the album). He then pauses to sing the main harmonic line from the chorus before adding, “Critics may have called it ‘pomp rock,’ but, well, I’m sorry — we’re musicians, and we wanted to use our skills to make sounds that were all our own.” (Hear, hear, Chuckie!!!)
In addition to the uplifting title track, Miracles boasted one other bonafide FM radio favorite: John “JC” Curulewski and JY’s album-opening co-write, “Rock & Roll Feeling” — a song that also features the quite-telling lyric, “But I can’t play no nine-to-five game / Hanging loose is all I know.” Incidentally, “R&RF” continues to be the most-played song from Man of Miracles on Spotify, with a tally of over 535,000 digital spins to date, and counting.
“‘Rock & Roll Feeling’ was a BTO kind of hit,” observes JY. “It has a strong hook and that driving, Bachman-Turner Overdrive kind of feel. I got robbed on that record because ‘Lady’ obliterated it on the charts, so there went my big chance of writing a hit single!” he exclaims with a laugh, referring to the quite popular, late-blooming single from July 1973’s Styx II that garnered Styx their most consistent airplay in both their pre- and early-A&M days — and a song that remains in the band’s setlist to this day. “But as a big-picture guy, I saw which way the wind was blowing,” JY concludes, “so there was very little point of me trying to contradict it.”
Incidentally, there’s more than one version of Miracles available in the marketplace. For example, on the subsequent RCA pressing of the vinyl LP, Styx’s energetic cover of The Knickerbockers' Beatlesque 1965 Top 20 hit single “Lies” was replaced at the start of Side 2 by JY and Dennis DeYoung’s “Best Thing,” a track originally found on their self-titled August 1972 debut album. Why did they wind up doing “Lies” in the first place, I ask JY. “There was no single on that album,” he replies, “and they [i.e., Wooden Nickel Records] said we needed to do something to fix that.” (Record companies always wanna chase that hit single, don’t they?)
Not only that, but the 1980 RCA cartoon-cover reissue of the album — simply renamed Miracles — replaced “Best Thing” with DeYoung and Chuck Lofrano’s “Unfinished Song,” a track that later appeared on The Complete Wooden Nickel Recordings double CD featuring Styx’s first four Wooden Nickel albums in full, which was released by Hip-O Records/UMe in February 2005. (Can’t tell your Miracles without a scorecard, apparently. . .)
The striking, painted Miracles cover art by Leon Rosenblatt (ID’ed as “Lee” on the back cover) is of a white-bearded grand wizard, seen manipulating by hand and/or other mystical forces the planet Saturn and an array of six of its moons. This iconic design later made a callback/comeback as the main image on the front of a powder-blue t-shirt sold at the band’s official merch table during their 2013-14 North American Tour. And if you look ever-so-closely, you may continue to find the Miracles wizard in the background of some other, more recent official Styx t-shirt designs — so happy oracle hunting!
He was a man of miracles, riding golden meteorites. . .
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by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Cornerstone, Styx’s ninth studio album, was released 42 years ago today by A&M Records on October 19, 1979. Cornerstone was the band’s third triple-platinum-selling album in a row — cementing Styx as the first band ever to have achieved that vaunted sales feat (with their fourth one, Paradise Theatre, to follow just two years later) — and it also spawned their first No. 1 single, “Babe.” The intimate, Dennis DeYoung-penned ballad reached the pinnacle of the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart for two weeks in December 1979 (specifically, on the charts dated December 8 and December 15). The album itself peaked at No. 2 on Billboard’s Top 200 Albums chart.
Cornerstone — an album referred to by keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan as being a “pillar” of the band’s “Big Four” albums (the other three being July 1977’s The Grand Illusion, September 1978’s Pieces of Eight, and January 1981’s Paradise Theatre) — contains a number of key tracks in the Styx oeuvre. Guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw’s mandolin-driven “Boat on the River” is, in fact, the band’s biggest hit internationally, having topped the charts in Switzerland and reaching the Top 5 in countries like Germany, Austria, and the Netherlands — not to mention its becoming a key track on Sing for the Day!, Tommy’s live solo release from June 2018 on which he was backed by the Contemporary Youth Orchestra. Believe it or not, “Boat on the River” also happens to be the band’s most-covered track, with many of its cover versions having been done in languages other than English. “It still amazes me how much impact that song has had on people over the years, and how far and wide it has reached all over the globe,” Tommy admits.
For “Boat on the River,” co-founding bassist Chuck Panozzo tried something new by playing a bowed, stand-up double bass. “It was something I hadn’t done before in the studio,” Chuck recounts. “Some people were skeptical about it, but that wasn’t going to stop me from trying it. I thought it was the right thing to do for the song — and I think it worked out perfectly.” Someone who particularly admires Chuck’s work on “Boat” is the newest fulltime member of Styx, guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich, who got to perform a special orchestrated version of the song alongside Tommy during the aforementioned Sing for the Day! concert. “I’m a huge fan of Chuck’s isolated bowed tracks on that song,” admits Will, who’s personally studied the original recording firsthand in much detail.
The album’s vibrant lead track, Tommy’s ever-uplifting “Lights,” has often served as a welcome staple in the back half of Styx’s extended live sets — and it was a standing favorite for Gary Loizzo, the band’s longtime live engineer and studio co-producer who passed away in January 2016. In recent years, the live version of “Lights” features an original percussion intro written and performed by drummer Todd Sucherman, along with Tommy on acoustic guitar throughout the entire song and co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young replicating the Ed Tossing-arranged middle horn section from the studio version on his electric guitar.
Cornerstone was recorded at Loizzo’s own Pumpkin Studios in Oak Lawn, Illinois. “For me, Cornerstone was one of those albums that went together very well,” Loizzo told me in 2015. “I was very hard on Johnny [i.e., John Panozzo, Styx’s original drummer, who passed away in July 1996] because I made him play nothing but foot, snare, and kick on a couple of tracks, and then he’d have to go and overdub the toms and other stuff. Sometimes, the sound itself isn’t the most important thing — you’ve also gotta get the feel.”
The album title came courtesy of JY, who also named Man of Miracles and Equinox. Cornerstone’s stunning artwork, which features a barn-door opening down the middle of the back cover that opens up to printed lyrics on both interior half-sides in addition to a shiny, futuristic silver LP sleeve, was designed by Mick Haggerty. (Unfortunately, some of the latter-day LP reissues do not include that way-cool barn-door option, such as the version of Cornerstone that’s included in The A&M Albums – 1975-1984 vinyl box set.)
While most of the attention given to Cornerstone continues to spotlight Side 1, lyrics from key Side 2 tracks like Tommy’s album-closer, “Love in the Midnight,” have occasionally been sung by its author before he’ll launch into other songs acoustically onstage. Meanwhile, the hard-charging “Borrowed Time” (the album’s second single, which reached No. 64 on the charts) has been discussed only in passing as a song that might be revisited live someday. (So . . . how about it, guys?)
Finally, on those occasions whenever I, your trusty Styxologist, suggest to JY that I’d love to hear his pleading “Eddie” find its way into the set — somewhat of a ritualistic request of mine, especially when we’re on the road together for an extended period of time — he will often give me a patented JY look and reply with something along the lines of, “You might have to wait on that!” before taking a beat to add the final kicker: “But I’d keep it in the original key.” (I think the message is ever so loud and clear, indeed. . .)
Cornerstone remains a strong pillar in Styx’s recorded legacy, and it’s an album worth revisiting via its finely remastered vinyl form. And all roads lead to tranquility base. . .
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by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Crystal Ball, Styx’s sixth studio album and their first to feature Tommy Shaw on guitar and vocals, was released 45 years ago today on October 1, 1976. Recorded at Paragon Studios in Chicago and produced by Styx with assistance from Barry Mraz, Crystal Ball reached No. 66 on the Pop Albums chart. Crystal Ball has long been certified as Gold by the RIAA (which translates to sales of over 500,000 copies), but considering how long ago that particular certification was done — i.e., in the pre-CD, pre-download, and pre-streaming era! — it’s much more than likely to have surpassed the million-selling mark at this point (if not well beyond it). “Mademoiselle,” with lead vocals from Shaw, was released as the album’s lead and only single, and it managed to reach No. 36 on the Pop Singles chart. (The song remains a band favorite to this day.)
“We knew right away Tommy was a superstar,” says original co-founding Styx bassist Chuck Panozzo about Shaw, his longtime stage and studio compatriot. “His songwriting, playing, and singing on Crystal Ball immediately elevated the band.” Adds Chuck with a laugh, “And he’s a pretty decent-looking guy too.”
Tommy had been recruited to replace original Styx guitarist/vocalist John “J.C.” Curulewski once the tour to support the band’s fifth album, Equinox, got underway in December 1975 (the same month that historic album was released). As recording commenced in Chicago for the band’s next album in 1976, Shaw reached back to his days in MS Funk to emerge with key elements for songs like the quite apropos uplifting album opener “Put Me On” and the “Crystal Ball” title track itself — the latter of which, as Tommy himself notes, “was a song I was playing in my $200-a-week bowling alley gig back in Montgomery, Alabama. It came to me pretty much all at once one time when I was visiting my mama at home.”
On many a recent Styx tour during a number of his spoken-word intros to “Crystal Ball” — right in those intimate moments before he strums the song’s iconic opening notes on his acoustic guitar — Tommy has often affirmed that he brought the track with him when he first traveled up to Chicago for his band audition.
Co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young, who was instrumental in helping Shaw and the band collectively “Styxify” the aforementioned title track, understands the song’s deep resonance to this very day. “I have a lot of people come up to me and say ‘Crystal Ball’ is their favorite Styx song. It seems to have an added layer of importance today with all the uncertainty in the world, especially with people who are searching for deeper meaning in their own lives,” observes the always-on-point Godfather of Styx.
As such, “Crystal Ball” remains an important fixture of many of the band’s longer live sets to this day. Tommy has also more often than not resurrected some of the lyrics that were edited out of the original recorded version, which instead now serve as the song’s live acoustic coda — so keep an ear out for them if you go see Styx live anytime soon, as you might just be surprised at what you may hear!
Otherwise, you can see an example of exactly how Tommy adds those long-lost lyrics back into the track during his solo performance of “Crystal Ball” with the Contemporary Youth Orchestra (CYO) — while seated right next to newest Styx bandmember, guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich, no less — on the Sing for the Day! Blu-ray/DVD release, which was recorded in Cleveland back on May 27, 2016 (a show yours truly happily attended in person, and thoroughly enjoyed). Sing for the Day!, which is also available on CD and via digital platforms, was released by Eagle Rock Entertainment on June 29, 2018.
Evankovich, who now gets to play “Crystal Ball” onstage with all of Styx after having joined the band fulltime in the summer of 2021, respects how the song’s throughline of questioning one’s own purpose, direction, and sense of self are among the core themes Shaw handles oh-so-deftly as an observant and insightful songwriter. “Tommy is that guy, you know? He’s always on the existential precipice,” Will observes. “He’s just like the rest of us. I mean, what are you thinking about at 2 in the morning? What do you worry about? Do you worry too much? Are you asking the anti-logical questions of why we exist? What is this all for? I really like how he does it in his songs — and he also does it in a way where the average person can totally relate.”
One other such notable lifelong fan of “Crystal Ball” is Loverboy lead singer Mike Reno. “It’s one of my favorite songs,” Reno readily admits. “That song is a total inspiration to me. When I was living in Calgary and playing in a bar band, I was hoping I could be like Styx someday and write songs that good myself. And now I’m proud to call Tommy my friend.”
Elsewhere on Crystal Ball, Dennis DeYoung masterfully performs French composer Claude Debussy’s impressionistic 1890 instrumental “Clair de Lune” (which translates to “moonlight,” and was further inspired by French poet Paul Verlaine’s 1869 poem of the same name) on piano as the intro to the album’s final heartfelt track on Side 2, “Ballerina,” a song that immediately followed “This Old Man,” a poignant tribute to DeYoung’s father.
Meanwhile, the beginning of Side 2 gets ushered in with “Shooz,” a catchy finger-snapper of a track featuring some Southern-flare slide guitar courtesy of Alabama native Shaw, as counterbalanced by JY’s patented Hendrixian fire. “I think they were only going to let me have one of those moments on the album,” chuckles Tommy. Adds JY, “I do love The Allman Brothers — and I’m not sure if we did them justice, but that was our attempt to go there. Our style had already been established, but Tommy was known for doing that kind of stuff in the clubs. I actually hoped we could have moved the band more in that direction."
If you too want more Allman Brothers-related joy in your Styx life, just check out the band’s scorching cover of the ABB’s indelibly pleading “One Way Out” on May 2005’s Big Bang Theory, which features Tommy on lead vocals, tearing it up like only he can. In addition to that, you can further access that instantly identifiable Allmansesque vibe during those special moments onstage when Tommy and JY play certain tasty riffs in tandem together on “Man in the Wilderness” and “Radio Silence” — whenever those two classic songs appear in the setlist, that is.
In the meantime, as we collectively celebrate this album’s magical 45th anniversary, we invite you all to please enjoy the many aural gifts Crystal Ball continues to offer with every successive spin. There are so many things I need to know. . .
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by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
Styx’s mega-triple-platinum smash success Pieces of Eight was released 43 years ago today by A&M Records on September 1, 1978. Featuring a stunning cover design by Hipgnosis — the British company known for creating instantly memorable album-package artwork for Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, UFO, 10cc, and scores of other bands — Pieces of Eight become the second of ultimately four consecutive Styx albums to sell more than three million copies apiece, the first time any band in rock history had ever done so. (Since the RIAA’s three-times-platinum certification for Pieces of Eight was done a good number of years ago, we suspect the album has sold many, many more copies in the interim. . .)
Just as on the band’s previous album, July 1977’s The Grand Illusion, Pieces of Eight’s overall production credit was again given to the entire band (“Produced by Styx”), with engineering by longtime collaborators Barry Mraz and Rob Kingsland. Po8 was recorded at Paragon Studios in Chicago.
Pieces of Eight reached as high as No. 6 on the Billboard Top 200 Albums chart, and boasted three hit singles, all penned by guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw. To wit: “Blue Collar Man (Long Nights)” reached No. 21; “Sing for the Day” got to No. 41, and “Renegade” made it all the way to No. 16.
Pieces of Eight features many key tracks in the Styx canon that remain staples in the band’s regular live set. For example, there’s the aforementioned and always hard-charging “Blue Collar Man,” the show’s onetime bring-it-on-home song that has since been vaulted up to the second position in the beginning of the set following “The Fight of Our Lives,” Crash of the Crown’s elegiac, kickoff table-setter. In recent years, “Blue Collar Man” has been sung more like the original recording after Tommy went back and listened to it as a personal refresher.
Then there’s “Pieces of Eight,” which, when it made its occasional appearance during some of Styx’s longer, two-set shows prior to the pandemic, would often feature keyboardist/vocalist Lawrence Gowan’s furiously engaging original piano instrumental “Khedive” (from June 2017’s The Mission) as its intro. And then there’s “Sing for the Day,” an acoustic-driven treasure that also served as the title for Shaw’s May 27, 2016 solo show with the Contemporary Youth Orchestra in Cleveland and was released on Blu-ray and CD by Eagle Rock on June 29, 2018.
Of course, it almost goes without saying we also have the cream of the crop that closes every single Styx live set — namely, “Renegade,” the eternal barnburner that gained additional life not only as a fourth-quarter rallying cry for the Pittsburgh Steelers (more on that in just a bit!) but also served as the theme for Season 2 of the quite intense Netflix drama Narcos back in 2016.
Me, I’m also partial to the Gowan-sung version of “Queen of Spades,” which appears in 2011’s two-disc Regeneration collection. (His unbridled cackle before the line, “You lose!” is simply priceless.) And, as many of you will recall, Styx performed Pieces of Eight (the first Styx album your humble Styxologist ever bought back in 1978, in fact!) in full alongside 1977’s epic The Grand Illusion on tour for a few select dates in 2010. This special two-fer show can be found on Eagle Rock’s live CD, DVD, and/or Blu-ray set, The Grand Illusion/Pieces of Eight Live.
GOT YOU COVERED
Incidentally, the design and positioning of the “mature” female heads on the Po8 cover itself is patterned after the monolithic stone statues that appear all throughout Easter Island in the Valparaiso region of Chile. The statues were carved by the island’s native Polynesian inhabitants, the Rapa Nui.
How the album’s truly mystical design came about is a story best told by the creative director of Hipgnosis himself, Aubrey “Po” Powell — who gave yours truly, your resident Styxologist, all the details about it from across the Pond in a Styxworld-exclusive conversation just for this posting. “It was intended to be as radically different as possible,” Powell told me. “When we thought of the idea of Pieces of Eight, automatically, in England, you think of treasure — doubloons, and other stuff pirates would have like that — so we wanted to move as far away from that as possible. I remember we were sitting around thinking of ideas, and Storm [Thorgerson, Powell’s late Hipgnosis partner and master designer] suddenly said, ‘Why don’t we create something like a strange cocktail party with a housewives-from-Phoenix kind of context?’ And then it went from there. ‘Why don’t we shoot the background on Easter Island?’ I was actually going to go to Easter Island and shoot it for real, but in those days, it was very difficult to get there. So, we decided to create a collage of these very conservative, upmarket, rich women attending a cocktail party. All the women at the cocktail party were very carefully chosen for their elegance and their age — and they all had to be wearing those Aku-Aku earrings, like the Aku-Akus that were on the island behind them.”
Powell readily admits the Pieces of Eight layout was a “high concept” design idea to the hilt. “If you said to me, ‘What relevance does that have to Styx, or the music?’ — I would have to say, ‘Very little.’ It’s just an image that’s hopefully impactful enough that people should take note of,” he points out.
Many people did indeed take notice of the Po8 album’s striking cover art — and that was entirely the point. “At that time in the ’70s, in the record emporiums like Tower Records and other places like that, there’d be something like 10,000 albums in there, so you wanted to create something that was a little different,” Powell explains. “When an album like Pieces of Eight went up on the wall, it would garner people’s attention. They’d be wondering, ‘What is that? What’s going on there? What is the story behind it?’ That was our exact intention.”
How did Styx react when the cover art was first presented to them? “They recorded Pieces of Eight in Chicago, and I flew to Chicago to go and see them, which was Storm’s idea,” Powell recalls. “I remember taking several ideas to show the band, and that was the one they all went on about immediately — ‘Yeah, I love that; we love that! Let’s use it.’ Why? Because it was telling a story, and Styx often told stories in their lyrics.”
INSIDE THE Po8 SONGS
As to the music on Pieces of Eight itself, Toto guitarist/vocalist Steve Lukather cites “Blue Collar Man” as long being his favorite Styx song, telling me, “They write really well-crafted songs. They’re a solid band, you know? They’re really good live — and that’s how you know it’s the real thing.” (Naturally, we here at Styxworld agree with this assessment from the guitar maestro sometimes known as Cool Hand Luke.)
Many people assume “Sing for the Day” was named after Tommy’s daughter Hannah Shaw — a.k.a. “The Kitten Lady,” who became a New York Times bestselling author with her August 2019 book, Tiny But Mighty: Kitten Lady’s Guide to Saving the Most Vulnerable Felines — but she was in fact born in 1987, a full nine years after the Po8 album was released. The “Hannah” whom Tommy namechecks throughout the song is meant to be the representative embodiment of the mutual respect between the band and their substantive female following.
And in case you were wondering, the absolutely brilliant pipe-organ solo performed by keyboardist/vocalist Dennis DeYoung in the middle of “I’m O.K.” was recorded at the St. James Cathedral, which is located at the corner of Huron and Wabash Streets in Chicago. It is the oldest Episcopal Church in the United States, having been founded in 1834 and completed in 1857.
THE RENEGADE WHO HAD IT MADE
Concerning “Renegade,” which is among its author’s most well-known and most loved songs, Tommy Shaw told me, “I wrote that song in my living room on my piano back when I lived in Michigan. Nobody else was around, and for it to become something that Steelers players and fans love, and also became a part of a show I enjoyed watching [i.e., Narcos], is so surreal to me! I’m so grateful for how much it means to our own fans, and how it endures to this day.”
Meanwhile, co-founding Styx guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young revealed to me the secret to all those scorching riffs he plays on the song: “To me, it’s Jeff Beck 101,” JY observed. “As far as the guitar solo goes, it took me all day to do it. I used my old ’65 Stratocaster, which had not really been modified in any way at that point in time, played through the Yoshinarator into a Marshall stack, as recorded by Barry Mraz.” [Said Yoshinarator preamp/distortion unit was custom-built for JY and designed around his ’65 Strat by Dave Yoshinari, a friend of his with whom he attended the Illinois Institute of Technology way back in the day.]
Or, as newly anointed fulltime Styx bandmember guitarist/vocalist Will Evankovich put it, “Oh God — that’s the Holy Grail right there, isn’t it?” And Will would certainly know of what he speaks firsthand, considering how he now gets to play and sing on “Renegade” himself during every live Styx set moving forward, Not only that, but Will also a) co-engineered and co-produced Tommy’s vocals and guitars on the Regeneration Volume II version of “Renegade” that were done at The Shop in Los Angeles back in 2010, and b) played acoustically and sang on the song right alongside his partner in songwriting during Tommy’s aforementioned Sing for the Day! event.
HERE WE GO STEELERS
Since January 2002, the Pittsburgh Steelers have regularly shown a video compilation of its mighty defense in action with “Renegade” as the soundtrack on the JumboTron at Heinz Field whenever the team needs a boost, usually (read: always) in the fourth quarter.
Regarding the ongoing impact of “Renegade,” Hall of Famer left outside linebacker Kevin Greene said to me a few years ago, “That’s a Steelers song. I hate to ‘claim’ that one, but it is a Steelers song. It’s an ass-kicking song, and it just really speaks to the Steelers and the steel-mill-town mentality. You know, we are renegades, we are long hair, we’re out there being wild and free and having fun and kicking people’s asses!” (Sadly, Greene passed away at age 58 on December 21, 2020.)
Added Hall of Fame running back Jerome “The Bus” Bettis, “As a football player from Pittsburgh, I just wanted to let those guys in Styx know how important ‘Renegade’ was to me as a player — and the fact that they allowed us to play that song, because it brought us so much joy. But it also brought some wins. It helped the defense pick it up. It made a difference with us, and those guys need to hear it from me how important that was.”
Steelers-sent messages duly received by “Renegade” songwriter Tommy Shaw, by the way, who responds: “I’m completely blown away by hearing this!”
“Renegade” was also covered in fine kickass fashion in 2017 by Shallow Side, an up-and-coming rock band from Tommy’s home state of Alabama. “It’s one of those songs that, when you play it and you’re nailing it and everyone’s on their spots, you can just feel it,” noted Shallow Side vocalist Eric Boatright of the track that appears on their January 2017 release, One. “The emotions surrounding it when we were doing it had that same vibe, so that’s where we were coming from. We wanted to make it our own and add a newer vibe to it, and bring some of the new age of rock & roll to it, right there where it left off.”
Songwriter Shaw wholly approves: “I’m impressed by those guys. Good arrangement, good performance, good video. By far, this is my favorite cover of ‘Renegade.’ Everyone in the band really liked it too. We love the song, love the video, and think the band has a great vibe. They seem like the real deal. They’ve got soul.”
And with that fine final sentiment, we now say to one and all — please join us in celebrating the 43rd anniversary of this most wonderfully endearing and eternally enduring album in the Styx recorded canon by spinning Pieces of Eight right along with today. Say it with me together now, won’t you: “Oh, Mama!!”
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Remembering the always upbeat founding Styx drummer, who passed away 25 years ago today on July 16, 1996.
by Mike Mettler, resident Styxologist
photos courtesy of Jim Cahill
Drummer John Panozzo was a force of nature, as anyone who knew him personally or saw him play live can readily attest. He laid the foundation on every Styx album right up through October 1990’s Edge of the Century, and he was poised to join the band’s classic lineup for the 1996 Return to Paradise reunion tour until he fell gravely ill and had to bow out. Sadly, John passed away 25 years ago today on July 16, 1996. He was 47.
The RTP Tour ultimately soldiered on in tribute to John, with Todd Sucherman taking over the drum chair (where he remains today, a truly vibrant force in his own right). Styx guitarist/vocalist Tommy Shaw wrote the touching “Dear John” in Panozzo’s memory, which was included as a studio track on the mostly live May 1997 release, Return to Paradise. (You can also find the song included on the May 2004 double-disc compilation, Come Sail Away: The Styx Anthology.)
In a Styxworld exclusive to honor the anniversary of John’s passing and celebrate his continuing legacy, we asked five of the people closest to the man — his fraternal brother Chuck Panozzo (the twins were born 20 minutes apart on September 20, 1948), the aforementioned Tommy Shaw, promotion guru Jim Cahill, the late producer Gary Loizzo, and drum maestro Todd Sucherman — to share their fondest memories of the always exuberant drummer. Dear John, we’ll see you someday again.
Chuck Panozzo (Styx founding bassist and John’s 20-minutes-older fraternal brother): I remember John’s enthusiasm for life! I’ve often posted some early pre-Styx pics and some from the height of our career to help put a band with a career that spans decades in perspective. I think I’ll quote JY [Styx co-founding guitarist/vocalist James “JY” Young]: “John was like Jackie Gleason and John Belushi — very physically funny.”
John could care less if you were the promoter or the guy who swept the floors — his only agenda was being the best drummer. That characteristic got him through the highs and lows of the entertainment world. The smile he had was genuine — and his love of Styx was too!
John was such a talented, quick-witted character. He made us laugh — a lot. He made me cry — a lot. He thought the guys who respected him just didn’t want him to be happy, but I now know that’s how the disease works. Whenever we perform, his indomitable spirit will be onstage with us in all that platinum glory — a living testimony to the once young boy who started a band that became Styx.
I keep getting email from collectors asking for a pair of John’s drum sticks. One pair was buried with him, and the other will be buried with me. It will go full cycle.
Tommy Shaw (Styx guitarist/vocalist): John Panozzo was a force of nature. His unique drumming style was the foundation for all those early Styx records that became classics. Not only that, he was just a lot of fun!
There was a physical presence to John. (chuckles) He would not think twice about having a wrestling match, or him and Chuck getting into brotherly “fights” in the car, or whatever. He was a practical joker, and he always kept everyone’s spirits high, no matter what. You could count on John for some kind of crazy thing to make us all laugh.
We were all saddened by his untimely passing, but his music lives on — and that’s a great thing.
Jim Cahill (Styx promotion guru/coordinator, 1977–83, and a member of The Mission promo team, 2017): I remember first meeting John in Racine, Wisconsin in 1975 on a Rick Carr-promoted show at Racine Memorial Hall [on January 3, 1975]. We met at soundcheck, and I was thunderstruck at the sound John and Chuck were getting in that small venue. A huge arena sound spilled from the stage, and the band was loud as hell. He had this way-cool drum kit with crests and ropes hanging off it. It was quite striking and memorable.
From the moment I heard the lads play, I knew they had what it took to get to the top. Much of it was that “big-as-the-galaxy arena sound” — the big drums backing up all that prog-rock swagger. After that soundcheck, I was immediately taken by John’s sense of humor. He was the one-liner king of the group with a wiseguy, neighborhood, smart-alecky sense of humor.
I remember one thing specifically that still makes me laugh. When we first acquired our own chartered airplane, during takeoff, as the plane was pitched on the steep takeoff angle, John would dramatically leap out of his seat belt and hit the floor, making grand swimming motions on the steep climb — swimming uphill during the climb sequence. The entire plane would erupt in laughter. It just energized the whole touring party with a rowdy spirit. John loved that plane, and eventually spent less time with us in the back and more time in the co-pilot seat. John got a pilot’s license, and landed the tour plane on some stops on the ’81 Paradise Theatre Tour.
I remember another time at a Japanese Promotional Teleconference, John doing the SNL closed caption gag for the hearing impaired — essentially, the gag was yelling the answer he had just given to reporters. Again, not a dry eye in the house — an international laugh-fest on that one. The Japanese loved John.
One more vivid John memory: Cobo Arena, Detroit, 1978. During our historic three-night record stand in Detroit’s legendary Cobo Arena on the Pieces Of Eight Tour, I remember the drum solo John played like it happened yesterday. Back in that era, the drum solo was a must do for arena acts, but this night in Detroit was something incredibly special. John began injecting his sense of humor into the solo with some personality — the whistle, the cowbell, quiet spots, thunder. I was standing at the soundboard for this gig, and there was just something different about hearing this loud rock & roll band at Cobo. I personally thought it was one of the best-sounding big rooms. I knew at the time I was hearing John take these solos to a whole new level, and that the “special something” that made rock bands into true legends was really happening to us — the “pinch me, I’m dreaming” moments — with John Panozzo leading the way.
Gary Loizzo (longtime Styx producer/live engineer who passed away in January 2016): I do remember getting ready to go out on the road in 1996 with the original band, and then Johnny passing. That was a big blow for all of us, because he was one of “the originals,” you know what I mean? Such a great player too.
Cornerstone [released in October 1979] was one of those albums that, for me, went together very well. And I was very hard on Johnny for it, because I wanted to get a good foot, snare, and kick from him. On a couple of tracks, I made him play nothing but foot, snare, and kick, and then he’d have to overdub the toms and other stuff. What I didn’t realize early on in that process was that just getting the sound wasn’t the most important thing — you’ve gotta get the feel too. So we ended up playing a lot of songs in full anyway.
Very rarely is it a real easy process, the making of an album. And most times, drums are very difficult to record well. They’re the basis for most rock & roll music, and they have to be solid. But Johnny knew how to deliver.
Todd Sucherman (drummer): I adored John. I loved his work, and his craft. Like I’ve always said, I’m a different human being than John Panozzo was, as would any drummer who would be in this band, or any drummer that would replace any drummer in any band. It’s impossible to play it exactly like that other person. It’s one thing to be able to play C, B flat, or A. With something as organic as drumming, which is as natural as a human heartbeat, it’s going to be a different thing. All I can do is try to make it feel as good as I can, and honor John’s legacy while adding my own stamp to the music.
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